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FKESH LEAVES 

AND 

GREEN PASTURES 




Qa^A A //// 



MY SON-IN-LAW."— W. P. Frith, 



FRESH LEAVES 



AND 



GREEN PASTURES 



BY THE AUTHOR OF 
LEAVES FROM A LIFE 



VW^. 3. t . \^^. ') T^-rv-Vov^ 



The old order changeth, yielding place to new, 
And God fulfils Himself in many ways." 



BRENTANO'S 

NEW YORK 

1909 






/ 9/^/6 



7 



TO 
THE DEAR MEMORY OF 

T.P. ; A.P. ; C.A.P. ; and A.G.T. 

WHOM I LOVED 

WHO LIE ASLEEP IN THE SWEETEST COUNTY IN ENGLAND 

AND WHO ARE NOW INCORPORATED IN ITS SOIL 

I DEDICATE THIS BOOK. 

I THINK 
THEY WILL KNOW WHY. 



CONTENTS 



I. What do they know of England r 
II. The County .... 

III. Townsfolk .... 

IV. More Townsfolk, and Others 
V. The Oldest Inhabitant . 

VI. Church and Chapel 
VII. Free and Independent Electors 
VIII. Defenders of their Country . 
IX. Finding the General 
X. " Come Out : 'tis now September ! 
XI. Some OF the Farms . 
XII. Round the Coast . . 

XIII. Alarums and Excursions 

XIV. Uprooting .... 
XV. Green Pastures 



1 

26 
65 
91 
120 
146 
173 
204 
226 
251 
274 
298 
322 
344 
366 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

"Mv SoN-IN-Law" — W. P. Frith . . . Frontispiece ^ 

Pillar from Roman Villa .... To face page 234 ^ 

Lydia Languish „ 246 ^ 

Pamela ,,248'/ 

Sketch to Illustrate "The Fallen Idol" . „ 354 ^ 



FRESH LEAYES 

AND 

GREEN PASTURES 

CHAPTER I 

WHAT DO THEY KNOW OF ENGLAND? 

It was only the other day that a man turning 
up the ground on a bare hill-side, whereon no 
digging had been done since the days of the 
Romans, came upon what appeared to be a 
coffin. A square end protruded from the dip 
which had been hollowed out to make a tennis 
lawn. Some one who knew happened to be on 
the spot; careful investigation of the ground 
was made, and finally a species of lid, sides and 
ends were uncovered and on the bare ground 
lay a few tiny bones, and the skull of a grown- 
up person who once, before history was written 
down, walked over the exquisite downs around 
his burial-place and took his part, no doubt, 
manfully, in the life that surged around him. 
Or, indeed, it might be the skull of a woman ; 
albeit the length of the cofhn denoted it had 
held a creature above the average height. Some 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

one who sat and watched her hero sail away 
to battle with her country's foes; or who may 
even have trembled at the fight that hurtled 
up and down the valley beneath her ; while on 
the heights she clasped her children to her, and 
wondered what the end of it all would be. No 
one knows, no one will ever know whose brain 
once beat in that empty bone ; no one can 
reconstruct the life-story of the human being 
who was laid to rest before the Roman legions 
came to Britain, and civilisation began to leave 
its mark on the rude people of those early days. 
Only just a few miles from where the coffin 
turned up was once a church surrounded by 
dwellings : now and then the ploughman's share 
grits on a specially stubborn stone. Curiosity 
causes him to dig ; he may find an exquisitely 
carved capital belonging once to a Norman arch ; 
he may find a burned flat stone that speaks to 
the initiated of where a house-place once stood 
and a hearth fire sparkled ; or again farther 
away across the hills he may strike even a 
greater find, and turn up a beautiful pavement 
that shows where the Roman conqueror made 
his home, and no doubt lived and died too, far 
away from his own beloved sunny Italian skies. 
There are those who from the skull just found, 
from the Norman capital, from the Roman 
villa, can bring before us the whole life and 
times when these things were part and parcel 
of the daily life that once meant England, to 

2 



WHAT DO THEY KNOW OF ENGLAND ? 

those who lived there at that special period and 
called it by the name that then was hers. Some- 
how or other, by careful digging, by surmise, 
by study, they have remade for themselves to 
a certain extent places and people as they were 
wont to be ; and if we have no certainty that 
such were their existence, their homes, them- 
selves, yet we obtain glimpses into the past. 
Sometimes the curtain seems to lift entirely, 
and we realise that after all evolution has not 
done quite as much for humanity as the believers 
in that theory think, that even in some ways 
we have gone back, and we are not as artistic, 
as clever, as charming as the barbarians we 
have succeeded and whose lives, as far as we 
ourselves are personally concerned, need never 
have been. After all the world is round ; all 
is a circle ; words we cast into the air circle 
about, and unless caught by some Marconi 
receiver that may exist unseen and unknown 
to us, continue to circle until they reach, may 
be, the recording angel himself. Stones cast 
into the pond make circles, and it is only when 
they reach the edge that the circle ceases to 
widen out and breaks. Families live, too, in 
circles. Starting always from the dust, they 
reach their apogee and then begin the descent, 
ending once more in the dust from which their 
first known ancestor sprang. What would it 
have meant to us if beside the coffin and the 
skull we could have dug up the equivalent of a 

3 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

library or a daily paper, even that banal and 
feeble publication, the orthodox parish magazine ! 
After all the British Museum does not go back 
very far if we allude to printed matter only, and 
one is inclined to wonder if even these records 
will last, when the New Zealander spoken of by 
Macaulay sits on the broken bridge and surveys 
the blasted and shattered ruins of a city that 
once deemed herself mistress of the world. All 
the same, I do not think the New Zealander 
can come yet awhile, albeit folks have been 
heard to prophesy that the endless tunnelKng 
beneath ground that goes on nowadays will hasten 
the catastrophe. Therefore it may be as well 
to put down on paper — for the time for the skull 
and coffin cannot be long — how people used to 
live, breathe and move in a distant country-place 
more years ago than one likes quite to confess to. 
For already people are beginning to forget: 
why should they remember in these days of 
rush and hurry and motor-cars ? They tear 
through the beautiful lanes, rattle through the 
streets of what they call, and with some justice, 
their dead-alive towns and villages; and while 
they see the village mother rush out and angrily 
shake the child, who has escaped death by a 
bare inch, because her mere nervousness makes 
her sharp; and note the rather dowdily dressed 
girls and women and the badly arranged shop- 
windows ; they may thank Providence for London 
and the big cities, but they do not recognise 
4 



WHAT DO THEY KNOW OF ENGLAND ? 

how the cities have starved the country and 
battened on the brave lads and lasses that once 
were content, happy and joyful members of the 
life that, alas ! alas ! has for ever ceased to be. 
" What do they know of England that only 
England know?" asks the forceful poet of the 
latter part of the last century, but I go still 
farther and ask what does any one of the present 
generation know of England at all ? What are 
her wide and spacious heaths, what her ever- 
rolling hills and downs, her rippling rivers and 
her delicious sea-coasts, what her darhng birds 
and her tiny four-footed creatures ? What, oh ! 
what to them, are the wide silences of the moors 
and fields where never a reveller screams or a 
motor-horn toots ? Nothing, surely, save places 
to flee from, unless for a " week-end " or a 
" shooting-party." Soon, alack ! they will not 
even have that, for the quiet places are doomed, 
and where the skull turned up the other day 
the circle has begun to revolve once more. It 
is two thousand or more years since a village 
was built on that cliff ; now wooden houses 
are being put about for week-enders and life 
is again astir on the peaceful and soHtary hill- 
side. Yet never again will the life I knew 
fifty years ago come back to the old town I 
knew and loved ; the houses are there, but 
though the houses themselves are unaltered they 
are lived in by the tradesfolk, good and worthy 
people, no doubt, much, much better read and 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

educated than were their predecessors, but they 
are not " gentry," not in the least the people 
on whom the County called once or twice a year. 
Not expecting their call to be returned except 
perfunctorily and respectfully, but with an eye 
to asking the men to shoot and the women to 
an occasional " tea-party " on the lawn should 
a " Village versus Town " cricket-match be played. 
Or later on again the volunteer prizes to be given, 
or even an archery-meeting bring together two 
sides of the " County," one to shoot against the 
other, before the enraptured eyes of the towns- 
people and their friends. 

When I had my first glimpse of this life it 
was in the year 1858, and oh ! how I loved my 
visits to the town I knew the best of all, albeit 
it was embittered to me by the fact that the 
servants would take us out at night and show 
us the great comet blazing away across the barn. 
How well I remember standing on the water 
butt, clutching the faithful Susan round the 
neck and looking at the fearful thing and pre- 
tending I did not mind ; but I did, and thankful 
was I for the day, and the cloudy nights when we 
could not see it and when it ceased to appear at 
all as far as we were concerned. Fifty years ago ! 
yet I can with one touch of the wand recon- 
struct the picture, albeit one has not much more 
than the skull and the few small bones left, as 
far as the human element is concerned, at any 
rate. 
6 



WHAT DO THEY KNOW OF ENGLAND ? 

Here is the house : a long, low house with a 
verandah, a circular drive in front of the windows, 
beyond that a fence, then a field, then the river 
and a deep red cliff where the sand-martins built 
and the reed- warblers' charming nests were found 
in the reeds by the river-bank. In the field 
itself grew scores and scores of mushrooms, and 
almost as soon as it was light the boys and I 
used to be off, returning home to heather-honey 
and new-laid eggs, and a dreadful scolding from 
Susan. Albeit we were soon forgiven when our 
stores were disclosed and an enormous stew 
turned up at dinner as a vast surprise for our 
elders and betters. The household was the 
typical one of the times, and as such deserves 
description. Only the other day I walked down 
the lane and seeing the old-time nursery window 
stirring to and fro in the wind unheeded, un- 
noticed, I could have wept ; the last child in 
that nursery is nearly fifty years of age and 
there has never been another one there since 
her day. I do not believe, look at it how one 
will, that the same spirit of open-handed hos- 
pitality exists now which one used to experience 
in the bygone days, neither do I see how such 
a thing could be possible. Quick transit brings 
distant friends even to remote spots for luncheon 
or tea, and takes one about even to dinners 
and balls ; while no one has time to stay in a 
place, even if there were a place to stay in, 
which I for one do not believe exists. But in 

7 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

the time I am now writing about, that house- 
door stood ever open and the guest-rooms were 
never empty. True there were but two, but 
I have known four girls packed into them or 
even more on an occasion, while the master's 
room was turned into a den for a lad, particularly 
in the shooting season when sport was to be 
had on the farm and on some land the master 
rented, where is now a big and charming house. 
The mistress was the real relation, by the way ; 
the master was only made one by marriage ; 
but he was one of the most hospitable of men. 
He was some years older than his wife, and she 
was his second wife, his first wife and family 
having died one after the other, but he simply 
worshipped her and into his wide heart he took 
all her sisters and brothers — these latter a thank- 
less task enough — while in later years nieces 
were as welcome as brothers-in-law and we 
always spent some of the summer there at any 
rate, and were made to feel as if it were as much 
home as any other place in the wide world. I 
wish I could draw the sweet and charming 
mistress as I remember her first. I thought her 
quite old ; I suppose she may have been thirty, 
but if so that is quite the outside, but to me 
she was venerable indeed. She wore her hair 
in curls on each side of her delightful face, and 
I can never recollect her saying or doing one 
hasty or bad-tempered action or word. I sup- 
pose her life would be thought very dull nowa- 
8 



WHAT DO THEY KNOW OF ENGLAND ? 

days, but she at any rate never found it so. She 
superintended all the domestic details of the 
house, and then when she had completed this 
work we used to go for a walk, I very impatient 
at the delays caused by meeting so many people 
she knew, or by the necessary shopping in the 
queer, small-paned, bow-windowed shops, where 
often enough we had to step down from the 
street into comparative darkness and were met 
by a mingled scent of new cheese, peppermint 
and dried cod, all of which smells are always 
connected in my mind with those very early 
days. Shopping in that town meant too a very 
great deal more than the mere ordinary buying 
and selling, looking at, comparing and pricing 
the goods. To begin with, all the week's news 
had to be discussed, the little happenings in the 
town, in the special house, and in the nurseries 
and school-rooms; the doctor, may be, had 
been seen to call, a black-edged letter was 
spoken of by the post-mistress as she placed it 
in the bag for the house. Inquiries for the 
absent sisters were made and indeed one was 
lucky if one only spent a quarter of an hour 
over the grocery counter, and about the same, 
nay, even more, in the very distasteful atmosphere 
of the butcher's shop. The butcher himself was 
then a great power, an abject tyrant, for he 
had no powerful rival in the shape of New Zealand 
meat or parcel-post ; he killed just so many 
" beasts " during the week and woe betide the 

9 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

housewife who offended him or did not give her 
order in due time. In either case she had to 
go without, lucky indeed if she could fall back 
on her poultry yard, for if she could not there 
were no tinned stores or things preserved in 
glasses to be had in those days, and to housekeep 
in the country then was indeed a fine art, or 
a desperate deed, according to the manner in 
which it was done. I was fortunate in my 
housekeeping days to have found favour in the 
eyes of the butcher, and we were great friends. 
Once I had an embarrassing and sudden call 
on my resources and I rushed up to his shop. 
It was a Thursday, and the place was empty, 
swept and garnished, save for one superb saddle 
of mutton which I knew somehow was being 
tended and watched until quite ready for the 
Squire's table, but I threw myself on the mercy 
of my good friend; I had that saddle, and I 
fear the one the Squire was furnished with 
the following week was not quite up to the usual 
mark. Another time I sent up and word was 
brought back that what I required could not 
be had. In the afternoon I went to the shop 
myself and saw the joint staring me in the face. 
" Oh ! you base deceiver ! " I remarked, as I 
paid his book ; " you have a leg of lamb after 
all ! " He looked puzzled. " Was it you wanted 
it ? " he asked. " There, I thought the message 
came from them 'Enries " (another branch of 
the family and one he could not bear) ; "of 

10 



WHAT DO THEY KNOW OF ENGLAND ? 

course you shall have it " — and I did, while 
my aunt was told that if a sheep had four legs 
mutton had only two, and that she ought to 
know better than order three legs of mutton in 
a week, for have them she certainly could not. 

The manner of paying one's bills in the 
earliest days I recollect was also a curious and 
happy-go-lucky one. Many were paid in kind ; 
the doctors, who were partners, set their bills 
against the tradesmen's bills ; they had no 
partnership account at the bank, but whoever 
received the cheque or cash seized and kept it, 
and though there was an apparent settlement 
once a year, it was a mere farce. Moreover, 
I have known a change in the partnership held 
up for years because it was quite impossible to 
disentangle the confusion between the doctor's 
own accounts with the shops, and those of the 
medical part of the affair. The lawyers were 
the same ; the different tradesfolk were the 
same, and I fancy the only man who paid his 
accounts straight out in money was the parson, 
for the pew-rents were duly collected by the 
clerk, who also brought round a grimy book 
at Easter in which one was supposed to enter 
a certain sum as Easter offering for the rector, 
the curate and the clerk, but as I never saw 
this book myself I am only giving a hearsay 
account of it, after all. 

As a child I quite well recollect we sat up in 
a gallery from whence I could see the parson's 

II 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

sermon and knew exactly how long it would 
last ; he preached from a regular " three-decker," 
the Sunday-school children sat on benches in 
the chancel, and the choir and the organ were 
up in a gallery at the west end, where is now a 
fine open arch. In later days the children were 
removed to the galleries and the choir to the 
chancel ; this latter improved vastly from their 
more prominent position, but the children's 
conduct became so infamous that a late rector 
did away with his galleries because he could not 
keep order there. I should like to have seen the 
faces of the old rector, clerk and churchwardens 
could they have heard such a statement ! Why, 
the boys' heads would have been rapped and the 
girls' too had they dared to misbehave ; and 
I have even seen young men and maidens at the 
evening service brought to book and many 
blushes by the churchwardens' sudden appear- 
ance in the galleries, or by a glance from the 
rector who had but to look in their direction to 
ensure utter silence at once. 

But I have strayed somewhat away from a 
day in the life of a gentlewoman fifty years ago ! 
When we had gone home after the shopping 
there was dinner; not lunch, please recollect, 
but dinner; sometimes at two, sometimes at 
four, according to the day of the week ; then 
we would find the day's paper and often discover 
sundry cards on the marble slab in the square 
hall. Calls were then made between twelve and 



WHAT DO THEY KNOW OF ENGLAND ? 

three, or between twelve and four, this latter on 
market-days and only by folks grand enough 
to own carriages. Will it be believed that it 
quite shocked the elder ladies if young and giddy 
creatures walked up the street on market-days ? 
The farmers might — and no doubt did — make 
personal remarks ; they might — oh ! awful idea ! 
— see one's ankles. As the market house stood 
at a corner in the square where all four streets 
met, this was not unlikely, more especially as 
the wind had a fine habit of careering up and 
down the streets up which, when there was not a 
market, a cannon-ball might have been shot, 
said strangers, and no one a penny the worse. 
I am always grieved to see the disappearance 
of these market-days, and nowadays I don't 
think any one would object on the score of the 
possible remarks of the farmers to walk boldly 
up, aye, and even do^\Ti the street on the day 
on which it is still supposed to be held. In the 
early days the little town was crowded ; then 
would drive in the great carriages with their two 
stalwart horses strong enough to breast the 
tremendous hills, their coachman and footmen 
complete ; the ladies inside, doing their shopping, 
calling for the afternoon letters and finally 
picking up the husbands who may have driven 
in earlier on magisterial work intent, or even 
to buy animals under their bailiffs' superintend- 
ence. For some of them were interested in model 
farming and all, to a man, dearly loved to hear 

13 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

and talk over the gossip of the week in the 
town itself. We never lived quite in the town, 
and so missed what I always like to see, the 
mere va-et-vient of any place; but we generally 
found a friendly window out of which to gaze 
on market-days even when we were quite small. 
The house we loved the most was a marvel, 
a microcosm of the last hundred years, for it 
was taken and lived in, quite a hundred and 
fifty years ago now, by the parents of those who 
were living there when I was a child. It stood 
square and solid opposite the market-house, 
which then was a small building with a cupola, 
outside of which the hustings were erected, 
whence speeches used to be made at election 
times and the poll declared ; and the furniture 
was almost priceless, though honestly we con- 
sidered it more frightful than anything we had 
ever beheld, but as it was owned by the oldest 
inhabitant I shall describe that later on. I 
believe on market-days dinner there was at 
four, and therefore we could remain there later 
than at other places where it was at the earlier 
hour of three. If we dined at three the waggon- 
ette used to come round after dinner and we 
drove out solemnly for two hours ; always on 
the same road, unless we had calls to pay ; for 
the master of the establishment had compounded 
for the tolls on that special road, as he had 
farm land in that direction although he was a 
lawyer ; and so we had not to stand and deliver 
14 



WHAT DO THEY KNOW OF ENGLAND ? 

the ninepence it would otherwise have cost us 
every time we went out for a drive. Tolls were 
a nuisance, but I beg to state that they were far 
and away the fairest means of enforcing pay- 
ment for the roads, and I think that Government 
would be wise who restored the toll-bars and 
took the chance of being cursed by the users 
of the roads, for the nuisance and delay they 
most undoubtedly were. I have myself used 
the roads in that district for four years and 
never paid anything towards a highway rate ; 
the motors that destroy the roads as fast as 
they are made pay nothing ; they pass from 
county to county without the smallest fee of any 
sort or kind. While the toll-bars would make 
excellent almshouses for old retainers, and they 
could be checked by some manner of self-register- 
ing gate which should mark the number of times 
it is opened and so make the old system of 
farming out the tolls unnecessary and impossible. 
Neither need the toll-bars be quite as frequent 
as they were ; on one road we could have paid 
three and, had we desired to go one way and 
return another, should have been obliged to do 
so; which would certainly have made the drive 
rather an expensive undertaking. After our 
drive came tea, a real sit-down tea, with cakes, 
jam, more honey and any amount of fruit in the 
summer, when the mistress used to garden and 
we played games with the boys. Sometimes 
I sat out in the meadow and scored for the very 

15 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

amateur cricket for cricketers, one of whom 
afterwards played for his 'varsity, or we played 
croquet. None of your scientific games, but 
the good old spiteful, hard-hitting business, when 
the boundaries were the shrubs and when we 
became so excited over the matter, that we have 
rubbed the balls with phosphorus, and hung 
lamps on the hoops, and played until nearly 
midnight, never recking that the dew was falling 
and the damp rising, and that we were becoming 
almost as wet as if we had been in the river. 

What, after that dreadful comet and the 
mushroom gathering in 1858, are my first re- 
collections ? I think the discovery of the deHcious 
inner garden and that strawberries and goose- 
berries grew out of doors and did not come into 
a damp and somewhat battered existence in a 
greengrocer's shop. What can equal the freedom 
of a fruit garden to a London child to whom 
fruit was a high privilege reserved for Sundays 
or when some was left over from dessert after 
a party? Or what marvels equal the discovery, 
that bought fruit cannot resemble strawberries 
hot with splendid sunshine, and just fit to eat 
on the spot; or even the humble gooseberry, 
red, plump, delicious and warm too in the sun, 
while, though our fingers and frocks suffered, 
no one scolded, for every one in the country 
took such destruction as a matter of course. 
Then to be allowed to gather flowers that did not 
blacken our hands, to even hold the tiny wooden 
i6 



WHAT DO THEY KNOW OF ENGLAND ? 

pegs used to keep the heads of the verbenas in 
place in the round beds, and finally to help 
water the greenhouse, the warm, delicious scent 
from which I materialise as I write. Can Heaven 
give one anything dearer, sweeter, or purer than 
a London child's first spring and summer in the 
country ? I doubt it, but if it can the sooner 
the gates open wide and let me in the sooner 
I will welcome the call to go ! I say a London 
child advisedly, for one born in the country 
does not, cannot, realise all the country can mean 
to one born in a city; and if as one grows old 
one remembers how good London is both for 
young and old, one can but look back at the 
peace that irked one at the time and at the long 
silences that were then as death itself, and realise 
that, kind as the country is to the town-bird 
for a change, it is not liveable in as part and 
parcel of it, unless one is born and brought up 
there, and so in a measure assimilates, under- 
stands, and becomes part of it and its little ways. 
After all, human nature is much the same in 
every corner of the globe. I know, though I am 
not supposed to hear, that the crossing-sweeper 
at the corner and the neighbours round about 
talk of us and speculate about us in London ; 
but there one need not care ; in the country 
one must. In the country, also, one has to 
realise with amazement the hundred and one 
differences in rank, so infinitesimal that it almost 
takes a microscope to discover them ; which all 
B 17 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

the same are far more real than the same divisions 
are or can be in London, where it is impossible 
to know that they even exist. In London at 
least creed matters nothing except to oneself; 
in the country even now it is a social crime to 
be a Dissenter of any sort or kind, while any of 
the fads which are a species of Open Sesame 
nowadays in London would be regarded with 
open disfavour, and raise at once an impassable 
barrier between the owner of such fads, and the 
ordinary people living in the country even in 
these present times. 

Very little interest in literature, music, or art 
was taken, yet politics were always of burning 
interest, though not as politics, merely as a 
question of party. " Follow my leader " was 
the political motto, and not a bad one, were the 
leader to be trusted ; and in the same way that 
wives were mere echoes of the men of the house- 
hold, so did the men echo and uphold the opinions 
of the party to which they were attached. The 
women talked of their nurseries, their gardens* 
their poultry, and their neighbours, but quite in a 
different way from the manner in which they 
discuss these matters now. The children were 
not examined critically and scientifically ; tem- 
pers were tempers, and not nerves; heredity 
had not come into sight, and therefore could not 
be taken into consideration. Children were 
expected to obey, and not argue; they were 
kept to nursery and schoolroom; while if the 
i8 



WHAT DO THEY KNOW OF ENGLAND ? 

girls did not expand as they do nowadays they 
were far more pleasant and useful, albeit they 
did not live and enjoy their lives in the style 
of to-day. If they are better women I do not 
know ; I do not think they are ; yet I scarcely 
like to say so, because I know full well that to 
every generation the one that is to succeed it 
always appears unsatisfactory; and after all, 
though we have different views, it does not 
follow that both are good or both are bad, or, 
indeed, that one is one thing and the other the 
other; they are different, so let the matter rest 
at that. 

In this age of rush and hurry I like to close 
my eyes and see once more the dear old place 
lying half asleep in the silence and beauty of a 
summer afternoon. The river slips under the 
grey bridge as it has slipped since the days the 
Normans built it, and the men linger and gossip 
there as men may have done when the builders 
left off work at the castle, and looked at the 
exquisite sunsets behind the long, lovely range 
of hills. But I liked even better than that 
the rising and falling sloping green walls that 
still encompass the town; where one could see 
both rivers and the reach where the bigger one 
of the two, spreads out to the sea, and note the 
tiny steamer puffing home up to the wharf 
from its day's work among the clay-barges ; 
or watch the brown sail of some boat gliding 
down to the harbour, the owner thereof intent 

19 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

on fishing or shooting, according to the special 
time of year. In our day no one troubled 
especially about the place ; we knew its history ; 
settled this thing or that to our own satisfaction ; 
and the old inhabitants specially prided them- 
selves on being bred, born, and brought up within 
the walls. And it is a curious revenge that I, 
who scoffed and sneered at the life and people, as 
youth always does scoff at age and slowness, 
have lived to pine for the peace and silence ; and 
the dear, good, kind folk who are gone; who 
have vanished for evermore from that special 
spot. One returns, says the proverb, always 
to one's first love ; as a child and a young girl 
I loved the place, and the people then were 
kindly and most hospitable. I recollect a round 
of mild gaieties which were joy indeed to me 
after the heated and stuffy rooms of London. 
The picnics were delightful, and more amusing 
than one could say, they were so different to 
anything I had ever experienced. It did strike 
me as weird that each " guest " brought his or 
her own contribution to the feast, but in the 
earliest days of all, the organiser of the party 
took possession of every basket, and all was in 
common. The shadow of the times had begun 
to fall when separate tablecloths were added 
to the baskets and each lady sat in state at the 
head of her own " cloth " ; outsiders were 
creeping in, " Johnny New-comes " arriving on 
the scene. It behoved the old inhabitants to 

20 



WHAT DO THEY KNOW OF ENGLAND ? 

draw a line, which ultimately proved a gulf into 
which all kindly feeling and fellowship fell and 
quietly disappeared, and now it would be hard 
indeed to find half a dozen representatives of 
the old families who once all talked and walked 
and played together. Nay, there are but two 
left, only two where we could have numbered 
once a gay and gallant show. 

My hostess herself never cared about the river, 
and therefore I saw very little of that when I 
was with her. I think she always expected 
the boys to be drowned; and also there were 
then only about three or four available boats. 
Now every one has a boat. I have seen motor- 
launches tied up at the spot where the Danes 
once landed to burn and ravage the town ; all 
the meadows round are dotted with white um- 
brellas, under each of which sits an "artist.'' 
Why, in the early days no one had heard of 
the spot, and picture-postcards were as unknown 
as the itinerant photographer himself, who now 
has his ubiquitous camera at every corner of 
the place ! 

Oh, how I hated the town in the first years 
I was married and lived there! I was Hke a 
wild animal caught and caged before I under- 
stood what life meant at all. I had been egre- 
giously spoiled and petted by the most enter- 
taining set of mid- Victorian times. I did not 
understand the country people ; they naturally 
did not understand me. Why should they ? Why 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

should they trouble to do so ? If they bored me, 
I was a blister to them, and having the training 
alone that bid me look to my " home duties " 
for all occupation, and that made me feel a 
traitor to my sex when my yearnings went 
beyond that narrow circle ; I did not avail myself 
of the small local pleasures, and only pined for 
the rush and hurry I had been so eager to escape. 
I hit out right and left, and made as much mischief 
and so many enemies — for which I did not care 
one jot — that I can only compare those first 
years to the time spent by a wounded animal 
in a trap, which hurts itself with its struggles 
and snaps at any kindly hand held out to mitigate 
its sufferings just a little. Now what would I 
not give to go back to those scented, gently 
gliding days ; but they do not exist even in that 
special spot. For we had only two posts then, 
one in the morning, the second at midday, which 
we could have if we fetched the letters ourselves. 
The day's paper came between one and two, 
and after that neither post nor paper arrived; 
and when it grew dark at four what was there 
to do ? Afternoon tea was not the common 
occurrence it is to-day ; after the midday dinner 
callers were not wanted, even if one had cared 
to call on the dull and to me stupid women- folk ; 
books were dear, novels in the three- volume form 
filled Mudie's box with enough reading to last 
me a few days only ; carriage was expensive. 
Nowadays one could not suffer as one suffered 

22 



WHAT DO THEY KNOW OF ENGLAND ? 

then ; one has but to walk up to the station and 
get the evening papers and as many books as 
one requires ; while that greatest of all boons 
to dwellers in the country, the parcel post, makes 
housekeeping quite easy and pleasant; and even 
if it harms the tradespeople it only hurts those 
who obstinately refuse to march with the times, 
for one never sends away, and pays postage for 
a thing, one can get as well or better at home 
than one can elsewhere. 

One or two curious features of the early days 
may perhaps be mentioned. The men of the 
household always went to the butcher, and with 
great care and nicety chose the joint for the 
day or week. At midday most of the gentlemen 
in the town called in at either inn, according to 
their politics, and had a " glass of something." 
On market-days there was a market dinner, at 
which all attended, and at some time in the 
afternoon or evening they went to the reading- 
room and assimilated the news, talking it over 
with each other, and afterwards administering it 
in small doses to the ladies at home. That is 
to say, if anything specially startling had oc- 
curred, or if there were any Court news; as a 
rule women cared nothing for politics and never 
read the newspaper. I have known my aunt's 
Standard unopened by her for a week if my uncle 
were away from home ; and to the day of my 
leaving the place but one family understood and 
shared my craze for news, and they, being 

23 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

Unitarians by faith, were well away from the 
rest, having always lived to some extent in an 
intellectual milieu. From the first I inspired 
distrust among my own people, because the fact 
of creed never did and never could interfere 
with my private friendships. How could it? 
In London a man might be a Jew, Turk, heretic, 
or infidel ; we neither knew nor cared ; but in 
the country ! Oh, dear dead friend of mine, 
whose every battle I fought, and who was worth 
all the Church-people in the place, what did 
I not suffer from my friendship? Ah, well! 
all her children go to church now whenever they 
go anywhere, and if she can see, no doubt she 
smiles at the strife of creeds, amongst which at 
one time no one bore a braver or a lonelier part. 
Smiles as I used to smile when the unanswerable 
reason why I should not see so much of her, 
" She's a Unitarian," was thrown at my head, 
and as I still smile when princesses change their 
special creed for a crown, and while the Church 
fights Dissent and the Romans fight both about 
the schools ; while the education given to the 
children is a farce, and does nothing but unfit 
them for that special state in life to which they 
shall be called. But stay ! the Church catechism 
is too much out of date now to quote ; one is 
not called to any state of life — one simply snatches 
what one can get, and, kicking out hard as one 
climbs the ladder, cares for nothing save success 
and enough money to enjoy oneself, regardless 
24 



WHAT DO THEY KNOW OF ENGLAND ? 

of duty or the hundred and one ambitions and 
hopes one used to have. Yet in yearning over the 
England I know and love far better now than 
when I had it, I often think the present day 
appears to us who are passing out of the crowd, 
as it must have looked to the first bewildered 
sufferers from the railway demon. We who 
came into our inheritance of steam as a matter 
of everyday life think nothing of the raging 
fiend that tears past every old-world spot, but 
what can this have meant to our grandparents ? 
Precisely what the motor and electricity, tubes, 
rush and hurry mean to us; so let us try and 
bear it. We would not go back for a moment 
to the stage-coach, the candles which had to be 
snuffed, or the dreary gurgling lamps which 
burned colza oil and had to be wound up with 
a final jerk at the most interesting moment of the 
evening ; so let us possess our souls in patience, 
knowing that if we do not live long enough to 
take the alterations which motors have made in 
a reasonable manner, some one else will, though 
no one will ever know the England we knew, 
because it has long ceased to exist. 



25 



CHAPTER II 

THE COUNTY 

For better or for worse, the old county families 
have altered, and in a great measure disappeared, 
while the old-fashioned tradesman and the small 
society in a country town have one and all ceased 
entirely to be. In my day there were about 
seven county families which ruled the place ; 
all more or less kind, if they had their own way ; 
all more, not less, condescending to the towns- 
folk ; while I suppose there were about twenty 
families all more or less friendly, and who could, 
were they so disposed, visit the one among the 
other, and might have had extremely good times 
had they been able to keep on speaking terms 
with each other at one and the same time, but 
that was never possible for one moment. The 
older people were censorious, the younger im- 
patient, and there was always too much talk 
and gossip going about to make life easy for 
those who cared in the least for what their 
acquaintance said and thought of them. 

Personally, the " County " did not trouble me 
26 



THE COUNTY 

at all ; but I could not fail to be amused at the 
manner in which their visits were received and 
they themselves spoken of ; yet I am sure some 
of them at least did their utmost for their special 
corner of England, and kept it far purer and 
better than it has ever been since their day. 
One of the families, now vanished entirely; not 
one member of the large family I recollect being 
alive at the moment; had in its time made 
a considerable part of the history of England; 
and among my many regrets for the wasted 
opportunities I had, had I only recognised them ; 
is one for the manner in which I did not avail 
myself as I could have done of the stores of 
history pushed away in the desks and drawers 
of that house. Stores which were ruthlessly 
burned in the stable- yard of the mansion when 
the grandson came into possession, could not 
afford to live there, and in this manner disposed 
of priceless historical records, because the house 
was to be let furnished, and he had neither time 
nor wish to go through the multitudinous docu- 
ments which filled every available place. I have 
never seen a handsomer family in my life than 
that special one. The mother was tall and 
stately, moved in the most beautiful manner, 
and spoke in a low, musical voice ; and she was 
one of the most militant and fervent old- 
fashioned Protestants I have ever met. The 
house was about six miles from a very small 
station, and lay in a hollow behind some hills 

27 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

covered with beautiful plantations sacred to 
pheasants and game of all sorts and kinds, and 
the house itself faced a little-used road. But 
despite this fact, a second road was sacred to 
the house itself, and on this no one was supposed 
to drive, unless one had business at the Squire's. 
The upper road was public only. Now there 
are gates added to the lower road to keep folks 
away. In the old times these were not necessary ; 
we knew our place and kept it, and would no 
more have driven on the lower road than we 
would have flown. 

The Squire himself was one of the most 
magnificent old men that I have ever seen, and 
I should think had given his wife cause for 
anxiety in the days of old ; and indeed at the 
present time one can recognise his brilliant eyes 
and magnificent hair and build in many a person 
round who has never heard his name ; and the 
daughters and sons of the house were one and 
all good to look at. The three sons never 
married ; all the daughters did, however ; and 
one can only wonder how they found husbands, 
for they never seemed to leave home, or to have 
many people there, though no doubt the sons 
brought home friends who were kept out of the 
sight of the townsfolk. Yet how this was 
managed I do not know, as every one who went 
to the house must have come to the station and 
been driven the whole six miles in the great 
landau, which, painted to imitate basket-work, 
28 



THE COUNTY 

was one of the carriages we never failed to see 
on the weekly market-days. 

When I was first married that stately carriage 
turned up our lane and brought the owner to 
call ; and as I was out a message was left 
bidding me to return the call on a certain day. 
Not being accustomed to such ways, I swore and 
declared I would do nothing of the kind, but 
I was persuaded to go, and found the stately 
lady at her stateliest in one of the most arid 
drawing-rooms I have ever been in. The room 
was large and well proportioned, and possessed 
six windows, each window being provided with 
a skimpy pair of red rep curtains ; the furniture 
was in holland covers bound with red braid, 
no doubt concealing beauties I for one never 
saw ; the carpet was green, with large red roses 
all over it. There were a few ornaments about, 
a clock, and some engravings of portraits of the 
family and other local celebrities ; but there 
was not a book, not a flower, not a plant, and 
her ladyship sat very upright by the fire, sparkling 
in its steel grate ; tatting, her foot in a species 
of stirrup, and her pale long fingers twisting the 
thread as she endeavoured to find some common 
ground on which we could meet. I think I 
must have appeared to her somewhat as a 
savage appears to the discoverer of a strange 
island, for I naturally had not one single thing 
in common with her, nor had she with me. She 
tried local topics, of which I knew nothing, 

29 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

gardening, of which I was then profoundly 
ignorant, and finally fell back upon religion, 
which I suppose she imagined was all alike and 
not to be argued about, as she was much surprised 
that I knew Colenso and had read "Essays and 
Reviews." This brought us on a little, but when 
she remarked quite calmly that she could not 
understand how any one could read the " un- 
edifying talk of an intoxicated old man," by 
which she meant the " Pickwick Papers," we 
sheered off Dickens, and, having received a tract 
and an invitation to a prayer-meeting in the 
near future, we parted, and never met again* 
Though I constantly saw the men of the family, 
more especially about election times; and was 
as constantly asked by them why I never 
appeared at any of the aforesaid religious cere- 
monies, at which, by the way, they were most 
conspicuously absent. 

For years and years I saw her driving through 
the streets in the carriage, gradually getting 
older and older. Her husband died, then her 
children, until she was left alone with one 
elderly son; and when she too passed away she 
was placed in her stupendous coffin by two of 
the undertaker's men ; such poor common folk 
that she would not have dreamed they could 
ever have been admitted to her bed-chamber 
to clean it out, let alone to touch her sacred 
remains. I think if she knew aught of the fact, 
and realised that she was placed in her last bed 
30 



THE COUNTY 

by such humble, gnarled hands, she would then 
have understood what the bitterness of death 
could be, and recognised that nothing is as 
humbling as is one's status, after one has left 
the body to any one who likes to do the last 
offices for it. Even now I cannot understand 
why such sacrilege was allowed. 

Her ladyship died in the room to which she 
came as a bride nearly seventy years before the 
day of her death, which occurred when she was 
ninety- one, and the room was as it was in those 
days, now over a hundred years ago, for she 
has been dead nearly twenty years. The bed 
was an enormous four-post erection, which stood 
out in the centre of the great room, and was 
made of beautifully carved oak, and at the head 
thereof were carved the initials and dates of the 
different couples who had slept therein, and 
had gone to their last rest from beneath its 
sheltering canopy. It was so extremely high 
from the ground that a set of three steps was 
used to climb into it, and it was furnished with 
two separate sets of curtains, one for the summer, 
of the most marvellous Indian chintz, and the 
other of a dull grey moreen, a stiff fabric never 
seen now, but which apparently never wore out, 
for I could put my hand at the moment on 
portions of this same material that was old 
when I was born, and which seems as strong and 
good now as the day on which it was made. 
The carpet was a good old Brussels, with a large 

31 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

square cut out under the bed, because it was 
considered healthy in those days for the house- 
maid to go over it with a damp cloth every 
morning when she "did" the room; and I 
daresay the fact that the great bed was made 
of feathers caused this operation to be necessary. 
Anyhow, it was done, and the space was hidden 
from sight by a deep flounce which went all 
round the bed, which in its turn served as a 
regular dust- trap, or would have done, had not 
dust been conspicuous by its absence in that 
clean country place. It always saddens me to 
see a similar bed-chamber, and this one remains 
even now as it must have been well over a 
hundred years ago. In fact, the bed itself is a 
very great deal older, for I think it was bought 
for the first member of the family who built 
the house, and, leaving his great business in 
London, retired to end his days far from town, 
hoping to found a race of stalwart men and 
women that should continue until the world 
ended. But it is curious to note how these 
vast families have died out in the male line, 
and how names that should have gone on from 
father to son have entirely disappeared ; and I 
for one should not blame that daughter's son 
who went back to the old cognomen and once 
more revived the traditions which must always 
cling to the very name. It would be a revelation 
to many nowadays could they see the enormous 
wardrobes, the stupendous chests of drawers, 
32 



THE COUNTY 

and the hideous washing-stands to be found in 
such a house ; and which point to the fact that 
the daintier Chippendale and Sheraton furniture 
was removed for the last bride who ever came 
to the Hall, and replaced by that which still 
remains precisely where it was then put. The 
wardrobe is eight feet long and of solid mahogany, 
and all the shelves and linings are of cedar-wood, 
while the washing-stands are quite awful, with 
low backs and furnished with a double set of 
ware, apparently to hint that dressing-rooms 
were not needed, and that husband and wife 
could never be absent from each other at any 
moment of the night or day. Bath-rooms, of 
course, were never dreamed of, but these have 
been placed in the house now, as without them 
it would not let at all. Yet, as no young bride 
has come to the Hall, the furniture has never 
been replaced or altered, as it has only been let 
to bachelors for the shooting. Because even in 
these days of motors few women would consent 
to live in such an out-of-the-way spot, the arid 
drawing-room is still arid, and what hfe is in 
the place is centred in the great untidy hall, 
the library and dining-room, and the gaunt bed- 
chambers, with their vast beds and their out-of- 
date carpets and gear. I often wonder where 
the big landau has gone, or if it is mouldering 
in the coach-house. I have never heard of its 
being sold; if it were I trust it has long since 
been broken up for firewood. I should not like 
c 33 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

to think of that stately vehicle filled to over- 
flowing by Bank Holiday people at half a crown 
an hour ; rather let it stand idle, falling gently 
to pieces in its old home, standing where it 
stood when it returned from the funeral of the 
last son of the house, who ought to have married 
and continued the family history, but who never 
did, no one could think why. No stories hung 
to his name as they did to those of his forebears ; 
he was a gentle, melancholy, unambitious man, 
much loved, much looked up to; but greatly 
concerned with his health, which need not have 
troubled him had he gone out into the world 
more and lived more away from the solitary 
place where he was born, and lived, if living 
it could be called, and where he died, not very 
long after his very old mother passed peacefully 
away. Not many months ago I was talking 
to a friend in the town, in whose welfare as a 
shopkeeper I had always taken a keen interest, 
and we were sadly recounting stories of the 
days that are no more, and amongst other things 
we were speaking of the many carriages which 
were driven into the town on market-days, and 
amongst others we mentioned this special landau. 
Then we passed on to speak of one particular 
carriage, which was owned by a bride we both 
recollected in her early bridal days. We were 
almost children, but we never forgot the pony- 
phaeton, the like of which has not been seen 
for years, and ceased to exist long before the 
34 



THE COUNTY 

all-devouring motor traction arrived, to keep 
such gay and gallant little carriages out of the 
country roads. 

Very different from the stern mistress of the 
Hall was the driver of those scuttering little 
steeds, albeit she too was one of the County 
folk, and married to a member of the only really 
old family in the neighbourhood, and she always 
lives among my most cherished memories. It 
would astonish the brides of to-day if they could 
turn back the pageant of life and for an hour 
gaze upon the life of a country lady, a lady in 
the very best sense of the word, forty-five years 
ago, and know how much she did for every one 
except for herself, and how seriously she took 
her Hfe and the duties of her position. When I 
see rich Jews and retired tradesfolk in the places 
of my old friends and acquaintances I cannot 
think that the extinction of the landed gentry 
is a good thing, and that the legislation of late 
years; though it sounds fair enough; has not 
cruelly crushed and extinguished a class that 
when it was good — and it was good more often 
than not — had an enormous influence on all 
around, and did far more for the country than 
anything else ever will. In my youthful days 
I naturally believed that every one was born 
free and every one was born equal. I think 
this is an idea a Londoner has more than any 
one else. In London one is free to do as one 
likes, to go into society or stay out of it, to 

35 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

choose one's milieu or to have none, and unless 
one has envious yearnings after social pleasures 
or for heaps of money one is equal with any 
one. We all of us own the most splendid pictures, 
the most magnificent buildings, and can see 
anything and any one we want. But in the 
country, if money could buy tolerance — and in 
those days it bought tolerance only — brains 
were nowhere, or else regarded as such dangerous 
possessions that the owner thereof had better 
be left alone. Yet it is curious to recognise 
nowadays how much cleverer these County folk 
were than I, for one, used to give them credit for 
being, and I am always sorry when I see the irre- 
sponsible newspaper-man speak with contempt 
of the "unpaid magistracy" and the "cruel" 
sentences passed by these said men on the 
destroyers of the countryside; and on the folk 
who, for lack of substance, or from choice, persist 
in " sleeping rough," as sleeping out of doors 
is invariably termed in the special corner of 
England of which I am now writing. For really 
no Londoners can understand that the sentence 
of which they read is really given because the 
last straw has been placed on the camel's back, 
and that the " sleeping rough " means that 
barns and ricks and whole tracts of heather 
and gorse have been destroyed, by the careless 
lighting of a pipe ; or even a field of wheat done 
for by the same means. While I for one know 
of entire districts where ferns and flowers have 
•36 



THE COUNTY 

been destroyed utterly because the " few flower- 
roots " which sound so pathetic in a newspaper 
paragraph have been really basketsful carted off 
and sold in a neighbouring town; until exquisite 
daffodil dells have ceased to be, and the wild 
and lovely snowdrop no longer blossoms freely 
as it used to blossom ; because of these said 
tramps, who have made a few dishonest pence 
by dragging up the bulbs as well as the flower; 
often as not casting the roots away to perish, and 
only loading themselves with the blossoms to 
sell. But in thinking of the flowers she loved 
and so warmly protected, I have gone away 
from my dear little lady of the flowing curls 
and the flitting pony-phaeton; and so well do I 
recollect her that I can never think she is dead 
and lies asleep in one of the most peaceful, 
beautiful churchyards in the whole world. It 
was always a charming sight to see her in her 
quaint boat-shaped hat, with its two long feathers, 
and her silk mantle, with her gauntleted hands 
holding a whip with a parasol fixed on the stem, 
and the white reins, driving in over the bridge. 
At first alone, her sweet young face very calm, 
very joyous, as became a bride, and driving very 
carefully and with many blushes to greet her 
young husband, his magistrate's work done, and 
to bear him off to their home. Very soon the 
phaeton began to overflow with babies and small 
children, all ridiculously like their mother, but 
to the day of her death she kept her young, kind, 

37 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

fair face, and the gentle voice and manner that 
used to set her special class apart, in an atmo- 
sphere of peace and patience that we of the class 
just below her never seemed to be able to attain. 
The parents of the husband were very different 
material, and they really were deserving of all 
that the worst Radical could say of their caste. 
But I suppose their age was one that, having 
seen and survived the Reform Bill, felt it neces- 
sary to erect and maintain barriers which only 
existed in their own eyes, and were scouted by 
us in the manner they richly deserved. The man 
of the household was one of the old-fashioned 
squarsons, and was Squire and Rector all in one. 
The property, curiously enough, has never gone 
from father to eldest son ; and there were some 
who believed that because Henry VIII. had 
boldly snatched the property from some remark- 
ably dissolute old monks, and sold it for a 
round sum of money to a man from whom the 
representative of the present owner bought it, 
there was a curse on the place. However that 
may be, the Squire I knew first was the third 
son, the other two having died unmarried and 
childless ; and he had an amiable feud with his 
younger brothers because he clung to and kept 
the dower-house, usually the property of the 
second son. But as the second son was dead 
and only the fourth and fifth remained, the 
third naturally kept it for his second son, albeit 
he never lived there, for he too died unmarried ; 
38 



THE COUNTY 

and, indeed, out of all that special family only 
one member now remains alive. He was the 
husband of the pretty bride, and is the very last 
surviving specimen of the real old country gentle- 
man that still exists. For, bad times having 
fallen, the big houses are let to strangers, the 
owner inhabits a tiny cottage on the estate, 
while the sons are earning their living; and I 
have no doubt the daughters would too if they 
knew how, but naturally they have not the 
smallest idea how to do anything of the kind. 
Personally, I bitterly regret the passing of the 
old-fashioned Squire. True, when he was bad 
he was very, very bad, as the poet hath it, but 
when he and his were good their goodness was 
wide-reaching, and the whole countryside was 
the better for their kindly if autocratic care. 
Even the last-mentioned folk did good in an 
unpleasant manner, and if only they would have 
realised that there were grades between them 
and the labourers on their estate they would 
have left a far more fragrant memory behind 
them than they have done, at least where I am 
concerned. I remember well once discussing 
with Thomas Hardy some of the people he and 
his folk had known, and being much astonished 
at the extraordinary stories he could tell of 
those who gave themselves the most wonderful 
airs, and in after years I found for myself that 
his knowledge was in no manner pecuUar, but 
at the same time I never met anything quite as 

39 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

amusing as one episode he related to me. 
We were discussing some very "proper" people 
with whom we had just parted, and who had 
lately purchased a most beautiful old house, 
the last owner of which had gone hopelessly 
bankrupt, and had in consequence thereof been 
sold up. " They have been years in the county," 
he said, "but not as long as those they are 
following, and they are capital people, but oh, 
the old grandfather ! I recollect my grand- 
mother teUing me about a very pretty girl who 
had married a farmer in the neighbourhood. 
Well, this man was always calling to see her 
when the farmer was down at the end of his 
fields. Some one gave the farmer a hint, and 
he returned home in the middle of the afternoon. 
The wife saw him coming, and the Squire had 
only time to climb up the wide chimney and 
put himself across the iron from which the pots 
were suspended over the open hearth. The 
farmer looked all round the room, saw nothing 
except his wife very busy, sweeping and dusting 
and singing, and he explained that he had 
returned home for a drink. She advised him to 
go and get it, and as he went into the dairy 
she saw the Squire's legs were hanging down. 
Without changing the tune of her song she sang 
' Tuck up thee lags. Sir John, Sir John, tuck 
up thee lags, Sir John,' and the unhappy Squire 
tucked up one and left the other in view, and 
she had only time to sing out, 'Tuck up the 
40 



THE COUNTY 

other lag. Sir John, Sir John,' before the husband 
returned, quite satisfied that he had been misled. 
Then he departed to resume his work, and the 
Squire descended very black and very irate at 
the ignominious position, and he never again 
went after that special farmer's wife." They 
certainly had fine times in the good old days, 
for all the ladies in Hardy's " Group of Noble 
Dames " can be named by those who live in his 
special county, while I well recollect his dear 
old mother saying that " Tom's stories were 
nothing to what she could tell," if she only 
would. 

But thinking of Thomas Hardy has taken me 
away from my special place and people, and we 
must return to them, for they in their way were 
quite as interesting and peculiar as any Mrs. 
Hardy the elder had ever met. There is one 
house close by the sea that has a particular 
interest, for it was the home of one of the Chan- 
cellors of England, and I often wonder what he 
would say if he could return and see how many 
of his prophecies have come true, though perhaps 
not exactly in the manner he expected them to ! 
It is sad indeed to see the empty, shuttered 
mansion that once teemed with life, rang with 
the voices of children, and was the well-loved 
home of at least three generations. Here the 
old man used to come after his fierce Parhamen- 
tary fights to rest with his beloved wife and children, 
and with his almost equally beloved dog, who 

41 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

is buried on the hills behind the house and has 
a tombstone especially raised to his memory. 
Here, one by one, his children left him, dying 
away, some in the fresh promise of their youth, 
some after great disappointments and trouble ; 
then his adored wife died; and finally he too 
departed, dying in London, and being brought 
back to be buried on the windy heights in the 
hideous mausoleum near the melancholy church. 
There still linger in the neighbourhood quaint 
stories of the eccentric couple and of the manner 
in which they never could realise that they 
had no need to save every penny. When they 
were very, very young they had eloped and got 
married, and every shilling was required until 
he had worked himself into the front rank. 
He must have been a strong, dour man, deter- 
mined to have and keep his own way ; but despite 
him they passed the Reform Bill and the Catholic 
Emancipation Act; and it is a bitter, ironic deed 
of the gods that the next owner of the fine old 
Protestant's house will be a Roman Catholic, and 
that those he so hated and abhorred will come 
into possession sooner or later of all that he 
made for himself. That it may be later and not 
sooner is the devout prayer of all who know 
and love the place. I am not at all sure that 
it is a good thing to have known a place and 
people for so many, many years as I have 
done, for how often have I not seen the 
fairest hopes withered, and the best of all die 
43 



THE COUNTY 

and fade, yet there is at the same time vast 
interest in looking back and going over once 
more the old familiar stories, and I only wish 
I could write down half those I have heard. 
One very amusing one about the Chancellor 
that was current for years is worth relating. 
He had gone into the neighbouring town, where 
there was a salmon river, and as he happened to 
be present at a lucky haul, he had with much 
trepidation purchased a large piece out of the 
middle, at the awful price of two shiUings a 
pound, and bore it back to his thrifty wife. 
As he reached home he could not make up his 
mind to tell her the exact truth ; salmon was 
always looked upon as an almost sinful luxury, 
and the consumption thereof was alone justified 
when a dinner-party was to be given, and two 
shillings a pound seemed criminal. When he 
produced his purchase there were groans and 
exclamations; but the Chancellor temporised, 
declared it a bargain at a shilling a pound, 
and the good lady, satisfied, consigned it to 
the larder, and no more was said. Vv lien dinner- 
time arrived the Chancellor looked out for the 
salmon, but it did not arrive. " Oh, I have 
been so fortunate," said her ladyship, in reply 
to his demand. " The Colonel called this afternoon, 
and I told him about the salmon, and he was 
glad to take it off our hands at one and sixpence 
a pound, a clear gain of three shillings." And the 
Chancellor, deprived of his favourite dish, could 

43 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

only congratulate his exultant spouse on her 
" bargain," and vow internally that he would 
never again prevaricate about the price he had 
given for any single thing. But somehow the 
story got out, and it was a bold soul in the 
County who dared to ask the Chancellor's lady 
what was the price of salmon. It is not difficult 
when the mist climbs up the hills and drifts 
along the lovely valley to imagine one sees the 
spirits of those who once made this place their 
own. The favourite walks of the old lord and 
his children are still there, but no one ever sees 
them. At one time any one could walk there 
who liked ; now, owing to the fact that no place 
is sacred from the modern tripper, the beloved 
spot is closed, and is as silent and deserted as 
the tomb. 

The next house was inhabited when I knew 
it first by a family which had obtained it after 
a most remarkable law-suit, won by a fluke; 
which determined it, and that most rightly too, 
in their favour. About the year 1836 the last 
male representative of the original family, one 
of the oldest for miles round, was living there 
alone ^vith his housekeeper, her daughter, and 
a maid-of-all-work. Gradually, one by one, his 
relations were estranged from him. The girl 
was very well educated, singularly so for those 
days, and as the old gentleman became older 
and older all his correspondence passed through 
her hands, and she gradually assumed the position 
44 



THE COUNTY 

of mistress of the house; and even the house- 
keeper-mother, recognising the stronger spirit, 
was content to leave matters in her daughter's 
hands and to help her in every way she could to 
carry out her schemes. The old Squire had one 
sister, whose butler was his housekeeper's hus- 
band ; and it was to this sister's married daughters 
that all the property should come if the owner 
made his will, as, of course, he ought, in their 
favour; but, try how she would, she could never 
obtain access to her brother's house. She would 
write, to receive a polite reply via Elizabeth 
stating that " Mr. John " was too ill to see any 
one. She once arrived at the house to find it 
closed against her, and while " Mr. John " was 
bemoaning the fact that his sister would not 
trouble to come and see him until he was dead 
and all would be hers, the sister was told that 
her brother distinctly refused to see her, because 
he knew she was only coming to look for a dead 
man's shoes. 

It is a desolate spot nowadays, for gates bar 
such roads as exist, and the roads themselves 
would keep away even a stout-hearted motorist. 
In '36 the gates were more numerous and the roads 
fifty times worse, and presently no one went near 
the big house at all. One evening one of the neigh- 
bouring gentry was about to sit down to dinner 
at about six — a very late hour at that date — 
when the husband of one of the co-heiresses rode 
furiously up to his house. One of Mr. John's 

45 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

servants, who had suffered from the house- 
keeper's vagaries, had sent a mysterious letter. 
" Mr. John " was dying, and he thought the 
heir-at-law should know. The dinner was 
allowed to cool on the board, and the great 
carriage and pair was ordered out, and in the 
darkness of the winter night the two men drove 
up and down those terrible, terrible roads, and 
at last drew up at the door of the house. The 
whole place was lighted, and evidently things 
were happening. The friends sprang from the 
carriage, and as they did so the housekeeper 
flung open the front door and peered out into 
the darkness. It was a wild, wet night; great 
splashes of rain whirled about, and the wind blew 
and howled as it all too often does in that part 
of the world. At last she spoke. " Mr. John 
is just dead." The two men looked at each 
other. " We must come in and search for the 
will, then." " Before God," she rephed, drawing 
herself up to her height, " there is no will." 
'' Then the Colonel takes possession as repre- 
senting the heirs," said the County Magistrate, 
and before the housekeeper could object they 
shouldered their way into the hall and closed 
the door on the rough and fearful darkness. 
Inside there were evidences that no members 
of the family were expected that night at all 
events ; for chests and parcels were everywhere 
standing about, and there were other significant 
trifles, thought of after, but not troubled about 
46 



THE COUNTY 

then. The housekeeper proposed supper and 
beds, but as the beds had probably not been 
slept in for years the gentlemen ordered food 
and wine and fire in the cedar parlour, and spent 
the night searching all the downstairs rooms 
for the missing will. All through the hours of 
darkness they heard mysterious movements about 
the house, much coming and going, lifting and 
pushing of heavy weights, and opening and 
closing cupboards and drawers; but the wind 
was terrific, and, moreover, sad and necessary 
things had to be done for the dead. It was 
only afterwards that suspicion was aroused, 
and, two and two being placed together, after- 
events proved that all through the long hours 
of darkness the house had been almost gutted, 
and when morning came the two men found 
themselves alone in the house with one servant 
and the body of the dead man lying unattended, 
uncoffined, overhead. In those days a remote 
country house was always victualled as if for 
a siege ; as a siege — by the elements — was 
always more than a possibility. Yet in that 
huge mansion there was not a pound of butter, 
a dozen eggs, a flitch of bacon, or a bag of flour, 
or a pound of tea or coffee ; the wine cellar 
was empty ; and above all not a shilling of cash 
was to be discovered high or low. Now Mr. 
John always made a practice of keeping the 
rents from one audit in the house until another 
audit was due. It had been audit day not ten 

47 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

days back : where was the money ? Not in 
the room where he lay stiff and stark ; nowhere 
in the house. Well, all that could be done 
now was to summon a staff of servants and the 
undertaker, and then decently bury the dead 
man, and enter into possession as soon as might 
be. Remember, this is no fancy tale ; everything 
happened just as I write it down, just as it was 
told me by the son of the County Magistrate, 
whose presence on that dark and dreadful night 
saved the estate for the rightful heirs. " Before 
God, there is no will," said the housekeeper ; 
yet just six months after the Colonel, his wife 
and her sister — these latter being co-heiresses — 
were settling " into the saddle," and things were 
beginning to go smoothly once more, a letter 
arrived from a small lawyer in a neighbouring 
town to say that Mr. John's will was in his 
possession, and that, failing the production of 
a later one, he should proceed to prove it and 
take possession in the name of the legatee, who 
was, he stated, the late bailiff of the late owner 
of the place, and of all the land for miles and 
miles round. I have always wanted Mr. Hardy 
to draw Elizabeth and her mother as they must 
have been, and I wish he had heard the story 
before he gave up writing novels and thrilled 
us all with his magnificent drama The Dynasts, 
for they only require his marvellous pen to 
spring once more into life. The girl was delicate, 
fragile, ladylike, and had once kept a small 
48 



THE COUNTY 

" genteel school," until, her health giving way, 
her mother had begged " Mr. John " to allow 
her to live with her and act as his reader and 
amanuensis. The mother was strong, scheming, 
extraordinary ; but perhaps not so extraordinary 
when one realises her name was once Churchill, 
and that in her veins ran some of the same blood 
that drove John Churchill onwards and made 
him Duke of Marlborough. Anyhow, the two 
together existed, planned, schemed, and were 
so nearly successful, that it took a judge and 
jury several days, before the will was pronounced 
a forgery, and only proved so by an accident 
that sounds improbable, but as it is on record 
in the papers of the time there is no doubt the 
thing is true. There was at first sight one 
object of suspicion. The seal on the will was 
blurred and indistinct, but this Elizabeth ex- 
plained by saying she had carried the will about 
inside her dress and the heat of her body had 
caused the wax to run, so that doubt was dis- 
posed of easily. She had promised, she said, 
not to produce the will for six months; hence 
the delay. Now mark the subtlety of the 
women ! The will was beautifully written in 
Elizabeth's exquisite penmanship, everything 
was left to the bailiff except a few small legacies 
to " Mr. John's " sister and her daughters, 
and while the two women and four men of the 
bailiff's family had witnessed " Mr. John's sig- 
nature," nothing was left to them. The case 
D 49 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

was proceeding merrily when some question of 
the date and hour of the signing of the will 
came up ; the two women swore to their sig- 
natures, the four brothers swore to theirs, and 
they one and all gave such exact accounts of 
how " Mr. John " was seated at such a table, 
such an inkstand being used, and such chairs 
being sat in, that it was evident to the meanest 
capacity that the matter had been rehearsed 
until it was word for word alike, and that there 
was not one atom of truth in the whole abomin- 
able story. But how to prove it ? At the 
last moment a woman rose in the court and 
said that at any rate one of the brothers could 
not have been present. For on the day and at the 
particular time, they all swore to as the moment 
almost when the will was signed ; and in proving 
too much gave themselves away ; she was talking 
to one of the brothers for a good hour. She 
knew the date and time, as her daughter's 
wedding was on that day, and she looked at the 
clock and had remarked to the man that by 
now it must be over, and she only wished they 
were near enough to hear the bells. As he 
could not have reached the house where the 
will was supposed to have been signed under 
at least eight hours, the case was done for, 
though the judge remarked that what made him 
think the will was invalid, was more the manner 
in which the housekeeper had denied the existence 
of a will in the presence of a witness, than aught 
50 



THE COUNTY 

else. While to me the most curious part of the 
whole matter is that no one was punished, the 
lawyer flourished, the women disappeared ! The 
bailiff to whom the property was willed refused 
to marry Elizabeth, to whom he was engaged, 
and Elizabeth and her mother were never seen 
again, though Elizabeth is supposed to have 
died quickly in a rapid decline, and the mother 
to have looked out for another situation, as 
her husband the butler absolutely refused to 
have anything more to do with her. One of 
my friends was a little girl of nine in the year 
of the trial, and she told me she perfectly well 
recollected the stir it made. Her father was 
the Colonel's lawyer and had the working up of 
the case, and one Sunday he, having discovered 
an unexpected clue to the making of the will, 
rode over to tell the Colonel about it. On his 
wa}^ he passed through a small village where 
the rector w^as standing at his gate, resting for 
a moment after his excellent dinner before going 
in to the afternoon service. At the sound of 
the horse's feet the rector stepped out and 
held up his hand, and despite the fact that 
every moment was precious and the congrega- 
tion was awaiting his presence, he held forth for 
half an hour on the evils of breaking the Sabbath, 
and ended by prophesying an unhappy end to 
any law case that had such a man as her father 
to engineer it through the courts. What he said 
when all returned in triumph from the Assizes 

51 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

history saith not, but he never ceased to tell the 
lawyer what the end of men who did business on a 
Sunday could not fail to be. True, the lawyer's 
end was not a very comfortable one, but that 
will be told later on, for except as a humble 
servant of many imperious wills the lawyer has 
no place among the old-fashioned County folk, 
whose decadence and disappearance I for one 
most profoundly regret. For, despite the success- 
ful end to the law-suit, the Colonel's family do 
not live in the beautiful old house ; there is no 
hunting among the hills ; the present owner 
only cares for that ; and so the house passes from 
hand to hand, from casual renter to casual renter. 
No one cares for the village or the church or 
the people, and I should like myself to see the 
owner made to sell all his land to some one who 
will live on it, and help those who so badly need 
help, and who can only be really assisted by 
folk who are born and bred among them, and 
who are known even as they know the people 
from whom they in a measure receive their 
means of living. 

Even in these degenerate days the village is 
a picture to the casual visitor; it ceases to be 
one to any one who absolutely knows the place 
and people ! At first sight what can surpass the 
beautiful thatched cottages, some of the gardens 
radiant with flowers at almost every season of 
the year ? But look closer ! Many of the 
cottages are empty, albeit a tiny place on the 
52 



THE COUNTY 

coast is much sought after by the inland clerk, 
or even the small professional man, as a holiday 
resort. Many have not the smallest decent 
accommodation for a family, which is often 
found there in the closest of close quarters, 
because farm-labourers must be near the work, 
to perform which it is becoming more diffi- 
cult every year to find hands. When the 
" Family " lived at the big house the cottages 
were spick and span, and if the people were 
dragooned by a martinet, it was good for them. 
The martinet was kindly, he was as a real father 
to his people, and he treated them as his own 
children, scolded, rewarded, punished, and, in 
truth, turned out most excellent men and women, 
many of whom were trained by him and his 
wife, and who went away from the village into 
the larger world, but equipped in such a manner 
that they made successes of their lives. If the 
parson at the tiny church described himself, 
half laughingly, half bitterly, as the Squire's 
" ecclesiastical butler," he was helped in every 
possible manner, his garden was kept stocked 
and in fine order, a horse and carriage were at 
his disposal, and, always supposing he had no 
hankerings after Rome, he did as he liked, and 
spent many, many years under the Squire's 
wing. Fortunately that special man was a 
scholar and a gentleman, he was profoundly 
interested in the folk-lore, the zoology and 
geology, every ology of the place, and when he 

53 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

died he could never be replaced. The big 
house was empty, or inhabited casually by 
strangers ; times and men have changed, and 
there are few elderly scholars left nowadays 
to whom the charm of the place would appeal. 
Even old men want some one of their own kind 
to speak to, and in consequence cleric succeeds 
cleric, and the few folk left neither care about 
the church nor the church about them, and so 
one other stronghold of the faith has gone down 
before the bitter assault of the Time-spirit. 

Yet there is not one inch of that special coast 
that has not the most profound interest either 
for a student of history or a mere lover of the 
picturesque. I never understood the heimweh 
of the Swiss until I abode under the charm of 
those " everlasting hills," but now I comprehend 
it right well, and the laugh of the black-headed 
gull or the croak of a jackdaw winging its way 
home to the old castle in the gap from whence 
it takes its name is dearer to me than the most 
marvellous music played by the most splendid 
band in the wide world ! 

Can nothing save rural England from the 
desolation brought upon her by the landowner ? 
Think what this owning means even in this one 
solitary spot. When I knew it first there were 
large and delightful families in the houses of 
which I have spoken, and there were other people 
besides. One big house held kind and generous 
people ; it is now a girls' school. Another was 
54 



THE COUNTY 

the property of a most extraordinary woman, 
who spent her money lavishly, and kept the 
villagers amused by a good band and many 
other entertainments got up at her own cost. 
True she emptied the church, for, having the 
usual feud on with the parson, her band played 
gaily during service-time, and the girls and 
boys at least preferred that to the scoldings and 
prohibitions they were treated to by the parson 
in charge. That house is now a preparatory 
school for boys, and a most excellent one too ! 
Then came the Chancellor's house, now shuttered 
and closed ; then the Colonel's ; then yet another 
house, the summer home of the most charming of 
all that charming coterie ; and then once more 
came a beautiful old manor-house; yet as beautiful 
despite the gruesome fact that sash windows in a 
moment of madness replaced the ancient mullions ; 
and though that is still inhabited by the owners 
they are on the move. The Time-spirit has 
jogged their arms, and reminded them they are 
now but survivals of a time when a man could do 
as he liked with his own. So, as the beautiful 
silence is broken by gramophones and motor- 
horns, and the exquisite cliffs deformed by obtru- 
sive buildings over which no one save the special 
owner has any control, the manor turns its back 
on all, and the old inhabitants are off. If they 
cannot rule, they will abdicate, despite the fact 
that at least a hundred people will be miserable 
for their departure, and another village will be left 

55 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

derelict, because, the head once gone, there is 
no one to keep things together in the good old 
way. It is sad to see the death of an era, and I 
doubt if anything will replace the real " County " 
folk, who are rapidly ceasing to exist. I liked 
their calm benevolence myself, admired their 
absolute certainty of their superiority to the rest 
of the world, and if I laughed at them, their 
queer garments, their hideous furniture, and 
their assumption, I should not do so now. I 
should not have done so had I understood them 
and known how they loved their own people and 
land. Tyrants, maybe, now and then ; still, they 
tried to do their best, and I for one mourn over 
their rapid passing. 

Naturally there was often enough a reverse 
side to the picture, and curiously enough that 
came on the other side of the valley where those 
I have been writing about dwelt for so long. 
How well I recollect the " wicked Squire " — a 
man who might have come straight out of a 
penny dreadful, and whose existence would, I 
should think, be quite impossible in these days, 
for surely some journalist would have slain him 
with his pen, and pilloried his doings in many 
a paragraph. He was an old man when I knew 
him forty years ago, but he looked as evil as any 
Mephistopheles could look, and his language was 
as revolting as his manners and customs. He 
had inherited large estates from his wife, who 
soon died, leaving him with two daughters, to 
56 



THE COUNTY 

whom the property was to go should they marry. 
This would not, naturally, have suited his book 
at all, and they were kept in strict seclusion, 
but somehow the younger managed to make 
acquaintance with a neighbour's son ; they 
eloped out of the library window and married. 
The Squire had to give up her share of the pro- 
perty, and he kept the elder sister closer and 
closer, until she became a melancholy wreck, and 
took to winding all the clocks, to mark the passing 
of the sorrowful hours, so that they should never 
be an instant different from each other. Then 
she never went out except to church, where she 
sat in the square pew that she would never 
allow to be cleared out of the chancel — she was 
lay rector — or improved in any way. Indeed, 
her interest in the church once took the em- 
barrassing form of cleaning and repainting it 
in such a manner that it resembled a music-hall 
more than a grave place of worship, and all were 
thankful when the decorations faded and were 
replaced at her death by others more in keeping 
with the sacred building. I always wondered 
how much truth there was in the stories told of 
this especial man. I have heard, when he owned 
the hounds, that his servants hunted in white 
satin breeches ; that money and wine flowed like 
water; that he breakfasted at dinner-time and 
dined in the middle of the night ; that the many 
lodges round the estate each held a fair and 
frail friend, and at the end a broken heart ; that 

57 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

he scourged the lads with his hunting-whip 
whom he found picking the snowdrops in Feb- 
ruary in the Park, and that finally he built himself 
a mausoleum, which he kept warmed because he 
did not want the place to be damp when his 
time came to be placed there. Finally he had 
a grand rehearsal of his funeral one wet day 
when he had nothing much to do, and was found 
by his agent swearing profusely, because the 
tall gamekeepers entrusted to carry the coffin 
could not keep step, and so would shake his 
corpse uncomfortably when it was placed therein. 
About all these items I can say nothing personally, 
except about the denizens of the lodges ; some 
of those at least owed their fall to the " wicked 
Squire," while I quite well recollect the hurry 
the village mothers were in to get their girls 
away from home and into decent service before 
the Squire realised they were pretty and grown 
up, lest they too should find themselves an 
object for his attention and be found a place 
under the housekeeper at the Hall. What a 
cruel tyrant he was, too, to the wretched tenant- 
farmers ! But more of that in another chapter, 
as I saw specimens of that side of his character 
myself. As I also heard samples of his lan- 
guage; once when he fell over a croquet-hoop 
on the lawn, when he was endeavouring to get 
a promise of a vote out of a man. who had never 
voted for him, and never would. The last time 
was when the poll was declared after an election 
58 



THE COUNTY 

that saw his back turned on the town, for his 
name was at the bottom. So he solemnly cursed 
the place and people, and, ordering his carriage, 
told his coachman at the top of his voice to 
drive him to a locality, where, if it exist, he is 
at the moment no doubt paying some of his 
many, many debts. " I will die with M.P. on 
my coffin," he used to swear, but when he died 
the letters were not there, and the borough 
he had bullied and coerced for years had ceased 
to return a representative to Parliament, and 
had been merged into one of the four quarters 
of the county. 

Hard drinking, hard riding, hard swearing, 
distinguished yet another County family, and 
to hear them on the hunting-field was to liberally 
increase, if one wanted to, one's vocabulary ; 
but beyond these three characteristics, which 
were, I fancy, a survival of the olden times, one 
heard nothing either for or against them : they 
were sportsmen first and individuals afterwards, 
and personally I never got beyond the first- 
mentioned aspect of the family. 

In my time one of the most interesting of the 
County folk was a man of a venerable Roman 
Catholic family, and his forebears had had wretched 
times now and again. Before the Emancipation 
days they were called on for any and every thing 
the king or State was supposed to require. 
Their horses were requisitioned, their plate and 
money borrowed and never returned, troops 

59 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

were quartered on them; they were allowed 
to have a chapel, but it had to look more like 
a Moorish mosque than anything else, while the 
hideous, very Protestant church was planted 
down at their front door, a constant eyesore in 
more ways than one. Moreover, it was an un- 
faiHng reminder that they were aliens of the 
faith of the land where they were just allowed 
to live. It is a curious fact that time, which 
brings about its own revenges, is now handing 
over that special village body and soul to the 
Pope of Rome. Those to whom the houses 
are let must all profess that special form of 
faith, and in consequence one by one the cottages 
are filled by Roman Catholics, who once would 
not have been allowed to set their feet within 
the portals. The dreamy mysticism of that 
faith is strangely out of joint with this bustling 
twentieth century ; but for all its bustle it is a 
time of superstition and quest after the unknown, 
and the Roman Catholics, being no longer 
harried, are a strong and powerful body in that 
little place. 

Though the owner of the Castle cannot live 
there, some distant members of the family are 
there for some few weeks in the year, while 
during the sweetest and best months the place 
is closed and there is no money spent, and no 
coming and going between the Castle and the 
country round. There are treasures of pictures 
and documents locked up there : old letters, old 
60 ' 



THE COUNTY 

diaries, old papers, that would make the fortune 
of an historian, as there are in many an old 
country house; while gentle ghosts walk the 
terraces and wail over the days when they had 
bodies and were real and tangible forms them- 
selves. I once had a talk with the oldest member 
of that household— it must be quite forty years 
ago— and he told me one of the most charming 
ghost stories I ever heard, but naturally I do not 
believe it. I could see how it grew until he was 
firmly convinced of the truth of the tale, and 
I only wish I could possess his serene faith and 
look forward as he did to the realisation of all 
his hopes after death ! 

He was a dreamy man, very charming, very 
quiet, and, our talk somehow verging on the 
unseen, he told me that he was once walking in 
the streets of Southampton when he saw across 
the road his son, who was, as he thought, in Rome 
with a tutor, but who appeared to be, to his aston- 
ishment, in Southampton, talking earnestly to a 
man of whose identity he could not be sure. He 
crossed the street, but in the confusion of the 
traffic missed his son, and, having finished his 
business, went home, expecting to find that 
something had brought the lad back without 
his being able to give notice to his father of his 
intention. But the son was not there, only a 
wire to beg him to come at once to Rome, for 
the lad was ill. Before he realised what it 
meant a second wire was brought to say that 

6i 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

he was dead — must have died at the moment the 
father saw him in the streets of Southampton ! 
A hurried visit to Rome did not obtain for the 
broken-hearted father the information he wanted 
as to who was with the lad when he died, for 
there were only the tutor and an old priest pre- 
sent, both of whom were well known to him, and 
neither of whom was the least like the man he 
had seen. So the mystery remained unsolved 
until some years afterwards ; then a portrait in 
the gallery at Dresden solved the problem. The 
companion was St. Charles Borromeo, to whom 
the lad had been dedicated, and who was his 
patron saint ! A pretty story truly, and a com- 
forting one to those who, like my one afternoon's 
acquaintance, thoroughly believed in the story 
as he told it to me. I was truly sorry I could 
not believe it, but I hope he thought I did ; at 
any rate, he never knew I did not, for I never 
told the story to any one until he had been 
dead for many years. 

It would fill a volume were I to dilate on all 
the romances I have heard about the old-fashioned 
County folk ; the tragedies that touched the quiet 
houses; the sons who fought and died for their 
country, and the girls who died as young wives 
or faded away as spinsters in the rigid home 
circle. Or of the curious survivals of the old 
haughty Norman spirit that came out in more 
than one story, the hero or heroine of which 
has gone back into the earth out of which they 
62 



THE COUNTY 

sprang. No one can require a novel who can 
read old registers and hear old tales standing by 
the graves where the men and women lie at rest. 
For think for a moment of this one ! A spoiled 
beauty, no money, a rich sister willing to give 
her a season in Bath; a successful suitor mainly 
for the riches he thought hers, then the drive 
back from church. He, knowing that the money 
did not exist, was prepared to make the best of 
it if she in her turn would effect a compromise ; 
an illegitimate daughter, his daughter, had always 
lived with him ; she must still do so, now that 
their means did not allow of a second establish- 
ment. The beauty stopped the coach, the bride- 
groom had to alight there and then, and they 
never met again. He left her money when he 
died, and never claimed large sums that came 
to her during his Hfetime, and I like him the 
better of the two, for he at least never bore 
malice. All the same, if the money had been 
forthcoming at once the daughter would never 
have been mentioned ; and the bride and bride- 
groom would have jogged on comfortably. As 
it is, one rests in one part of England and the 
other sleeps at her old home, and one wonders 
if their spirits met and talked over the marriage 
that never was a marriage, and the long years 
during which they never met, or, indeed, com- 
municated with each other. 

If the graves could only give up the dead, one 
would hear even more curious stories than these. 

63 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

Unmarked, unknown is the spot where sleeps 
the old rector who for fifty odd years preached 
the Gospel in the now desolate and deserted 
little church. He went off to the county gaol 
for his opinions, for he spoke out against corrup- 
tion in high places, but came back to his own 
when the king against whom he had held forth 
ceased to be. While one of his successors, 
whose grave is very evident, and well kept, for 
he was " County," was still more curious and 
worthy to be recollected for his quaint personality, 
though he mainly cared about his dinner, and 
had been known to sit down to the whole of a 
haunch of venison by himself, and, moreover, to 
eat all that was worth eating of that colossal 
joint. He it was who used to climb to w^here 
he could see the kitchen-chimneys of seven 
small manor-houses smoking on Sunday, and 
used to claim his dinner where much smoke 
promised a lordly feed ; while, not caring much 
for his family at any time, he built himself a 
house in the cleft of a hill without any drivable 
road. He could ride, the others could only 
travel in carriages, and there he remained solitary 
and alone until he died. " The head of an ass, 
and not the tail of a lion," as he remarked when 
asked why he lived by himself and not with his 
old mother in the manor-house. But the lion 
was known as a fierce one, and perhaps he did 
well to choose a position where, ass or not, he 
was the head. 
64 



CHAPTER III 

TOWNSFOLK 

Really, the proper title of this chapter would 
be, I think, the one word "Waste," for surely 
never were any lives so utterly wasted and thrown 
away as those lived in a country town in the 
middle of the last century, especially among the 
women-folk belonging to the professional men of 
the place. I do not mean that the wives and 
mothers were wasted, but that the young girls 
and women simply withered on their stalks, so 
few were the outlets for their energies, and so 
little knowledge had they of what life really 
could have meant, had they been given a wider 
atmosphere, and learned all that they could have 
had and done; were their lot cast in any other 
place than a small and obscure country town. 
It is a woman's own fault nowadays if she does 
not live a wide and amusing life ; but in mid- 
Victorian days she would have been at once un- 
classed had she had the temerity ; and I may add 
the brains; to enable her to leave home and 
make a career for herself. Indeed, how could 
E 65 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

she have done so ? Take, for example, the 
people I knew myself : one " such a bright, 
impulsive girl when she left school," said my 
aunt with a sigh, when I commented angrily on 
the manner in which she never seemed to touch 
a book or newspaper or care for anything beyond 
the mere daily routine and gossip of the towns- 
people. Bright ! impulsive ! Could she ever have 
been either the one or the other, before she was 
engulphed in the toils of the family requirements, 
and becoming thinner, more angular, more drab- 
coloured every year; finally faded away and 
died in the house where she was born ! She 
had outlived her parents and seen her brothers 
married, and in this dreary round fulfilled her 
destiny to the satisfaction of all, for such a 
career was considered the only right one for a 
woman in the so-called good old times. She 
was never sour or bitter, never disagreeable, and 
if she had the quaintest and narrowest ideas of 
her duty, she lived distinctly up to her ideals; 
and though she was once deeply in love, and 
most bitterly disappointed at the defection of 
her suitor, who left her for a more amply dowered 
maiden, she never allowed it to warp her kindly 
soul. Still, she could and did speak out when 
things were not just as she thought they ought 
to be, but she never gossiped or took away a 
character, but went straight to the delinquent 
and had it out, as she expressed it, on the spot. 
It was a quaint and interesting household to me, 
66 



TOWNSFOLK 

for I had never conceived such a one could exist 
out of the pages of " Cranford " or " Our Village." 
As in most of the houses of the town, the hours 
were regulated entirely to suit the men of the 
household, to minister to whom, apparently, was 
the one raison d'etre of the female sex. The 
breakfast was at eight, shared by all ; the mother 
in her prim cap, apron, and full stuff dress at 
the head of the table, the father at the foot, 
and the sons and daughter at the sides. Oh ! 
prayers came first, short and sharp and to the 
point; and then the two maids dispersed to 
their duties upstairs, for the "breakfast-room" 
opened out of the kitchen, and while letters had 
to be discussed by the gentlemen, the maids were 
best out of the way. There was generally a dis- 
cussion as to which hen's eggs they were eating ; 
or which particular pig furnished the bacon or 
ham, while the quality of the butter and flour 
also came in for mention, favourable or otherwise. 
Then the head of the household would retire to 
the larder and discuss the meals for the day with 
his wife, while the young men got on their boots ; 
slippers being worn until then ; and the daughter 
went to dust the drawing-room and the bed- 
rooms, and to look over the linen, or to perform 
other small domestic tasks. Then she and her 
mother would sit down to two or three hours' 
solid needlework, all the men's shirts and their 
own under-garments being made at home, until 
it was time to make calls. Then, card-case in 

67 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

hand, they would sally forth and solemnly call 
on Avomen they saw every day of their lives, in 
the street or at each other's houses ; while 
after the awful midday dinner there was more 
needlework, sometimes of a fancy nature, for 
*' white work " was not considered polite after 
four o'clock; neither did the sparse lights in 
winter allow of much plain sewing. Knitting 
filled the older fingers, and tatting and crochet 
the younger hands, this everlasting " edging " 
being yet to be found on ancient garments that 
have served their makers for something like 
forty years. As a rule the men came in to tea, 
and rarely stirred out afterwards, in the winter 
at any rate, and this was supposed to be the 
best part of the day. For all came in with more 
or less thrilling accounts of the happenings in 
and around the town. I must have given them 
many a happy half-hour, for they never could 
make out what I was doing or going to do, 
except that they were quite sure it would be 
something that no one save myself would ever 
think of undertaking ; and, indeed, had I my time 
to go over again I should certainly have left 
the place abjectly alone, and it would have been 
none the worse had I done so. 

There was an awful custom when I was 
married that enforced a new-made bride to 
remain at home for at least three days after her 
appearance at church suggested that she was 
ready and anxious to receive calls. But un- 
68 



TOWNSFOLK 

fortunately I never believed that this rule could 
apply to me. We went to church as a matter 
of course in those days, and I was most surprised 
to see how much interest our appearance caused, 
and to find the pew we shared with an elderly 
couple empty, swept and garnished, so to speak, 
and left entirely to our two selves. I am afraid, 
too, my costume left much to be desired, for I 
had no idea that one's very best dress should 
have been donned on such an auspicious occasion. 
It being a very hot August Sunday, I had quite 
an ordinary muslin dress on. I can see it now : 
small mauve leaves on a spotted ground, worn 
over a silk skirt ; really because it is economical 
to wear out an old silk skirt in this manner, and 
saves the washing, but suggesting such depths 
of depravity and recklessness to the good folk 
in church that whatever troubles we had later 
on were all put down, I am convinced, to that 
same silk skirt. If they could only have known 
that it began life as a white silk ball dress, then, 
dyed brown, became a useful afternoon frock, 
and finally, when black, made a most serviceable 
underskirt, I think I should have won praise, and 
not been quite as hardly judged as I was at 
the time. The inexpensive muslin annoyed them 
as much as the silk, for had not the last bride 
swept into church in a splendid grey silk with 
broad pink stripes, and a bonnet full of pink 
feathers ? while she even changed for the evening 
service and came in yet more gorgeous apparel ; 

69 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

while I, having gone to tea with my aunt, 
thought an evening at home in the garden 
very much nicer than any more church could 
possibly be. 

It is curious to recollect how the bells of the 
fine old church used to ring for all our domestic 
happenings. Nowadays nothing under a Royal 
visit or a victory in war-time or a wedding gets 
a note out of them. When we returned home 
from our honeymoon they rang well into the 
night, and when our children were born the 
same rapturous peals rang out, much to the joy 
of the ringers, who always, of course, obtained a 
handsome tip. Then great pleasure was given 
the townsfolk also, for we one and all liked to 
know that things were well around and about us. 
There was a family feeling, too, in the place, 
and I think that accounted as much for a great 
deal of the curious gossip that went on as 
anything else; for what family exists nowadays 
that does not consider it its duty to tell each 
other just what he or she thinks of their doings 
and comings and goings, generally putting the 
worst construction they can on the very simplest 
things of which they hear ? One chooses one's 
friends, one is born into one's family, and I 
for one think it a great pity that one cannot 
choose them as well as one does one's acquaint- 
ances. If I were to begin my life in the country 
over again, I should not commence it in early 
autumn, for the months that follow on September 
70 



TOWNSFOLK 

are the worst in all the year, at any rate for a 
novice and for one who does not easily make 
friends or take a lively interest in her neighbours' 
concerns. Yet now I should understand how 
kind those said neighbours meant to be, and 
know what an effect my unconventional ways 
had on them. 

The family I have described were typical of 
the townsfolk, and they had in their houses 
stores of the most beautiful things I have ever 
beheld ; many of which are yet in their old places. 
One of their relatives had been captain of an 
East-Indiaman and had sailed the stormy seas 
for many a long year. He must have been a 
noble seaman too, for there are yet extant great 
salvers boldly engraved with long lists of names 
of those whose gratitude took this form when 
he had brought them safely to shore through 
treacherous tempests and great cyclonic storms. 
The china, too, is a sight to behold : the first 
china bedroom ware was brought to England 
by him, and was actually used in the best " spare 
room " until some one mentioned the great 
value thereof, and it was put safely away in one 
of the tall lacquer cabinets the Captain had also 
brought back and housed in his brother's 
drawing-room until such time as he should settle 
down and have a place of his own to die in. 
But better luck was his : no tame death in a 
comfortable bed with doctor and parson in 
attendance, and the sexton ready to toll the bell. 

71 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

He went down with his ship off the coast of 
India, and though his passengers and many of 
his crew were saved, the gallant Captain went 
to his last sleep among the waves he had always 
loved, and never returned to claim the many 
things he had brought back from distant parts 
to the old home. All the china used, too, for 
breakfast, tea, and dinner was what is now known 
as " old china," and it must have survived 
simply because the ladies of the family washed it 
themselves, polishing it daintily with soft silk 
handkerchiefs, and taking immense pride in the 
work. Really the housewives of that day were 
actual slaves, first to the men of the house and 
afterwards to their " things." And no doubt 
they were obliged to be, because of the fearful 
prices of materials and the costliness of the 
commonest household plenishing; but I trust 
I may not live to see it necessary to wash up 
one's china oneself, and to draw down every 
blind and obscure every glimpse of sunshine 
because, once faded and rotten, new things can- 
not possibly be had. I believe in some houses 
that spring cleaning is yet a time of stress and 
torment ; in that town a solemn fortnight was 
given over to the truly awful domestic rite. It 
began in the attics, where were stored the 
summer curtains and carpets and bed-hangings 
that were to replace those used when the fires 
were de rigueur. After Fair-day, which occurred 
about the middle of April, the fires were never 
72 



TOWNSFOLK 

allowed, for not only were the ordinary black 
bars removed from the grates, and replaced by 
elaborate steel ones which had passed the winter 
rubbed with mutton-fat and enrolled in brown 
paper, but vast arrangements of pulled-out 
fibres were placed in the grates. Moreover, if 
young and artistic females composed part of the 
household, dried fern leaves and threads of gilt 
paper lay gracefully over the white expanse. 
I have been guilty of those fern leaves myself : 
gathering them when fully out, putting them 
between blotting paper and drying them, and 
fina,lly pressing them between many books to 
preserve them for use in the summer. But that 
was in my early days ; after the first summer or 
two I always kept my fires ready to light, 
despite the fact that I owned the most stupendous 
steel grate in the town, which, as long as I 
allowed it to dominate me, was the curse of my 
existence. It took any maid-servant three whole 
hours to clean and burnish, and what that meant 
I at least could not for one moment allow to 
continue where I was. I suppose, however, the 
women who really were cowed by their possessions 
were actually the happiest, for they could never 
have had an hour to spare or to waste in empty 
groans over their fate. But I for one never 
could make a culte of my Lares and Penates ; 
neither had I the least idea of what house- 
keeping could be made to mean; and as to servants, 
they were more or less part of the household to 

73 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

us, and so did not require the perpetual hunting 
up thought necessary in those days. My mother 
had the gift of keeping hers, and in consequence 
they had all been with us so long when I married 
that I could not comprehend that maids could be 
anything save members of the family, a matter 
that caused much talk when I lent one of my 
two maids a white petticoat to go to a " party " 
in and another a nightdress in which to face the 
doctor. For in those bygone days and in those 
primitive parts maid-servants prepared for rest 
by simply tying the flaps of their under-garments 
over their necks and shoulders ; folding them 
back, and fastening them round their waists in 
the day-time; and scarcely one possessed the 
most elementary night garment at all. 

There was yet more " waste " of woman's life 
and talents in another family, long since scattered. 
Indeed, most of the members thereof are dead, 
while those who are alive have become so rich 
and prosperous that they have quietly buried 
the old life, and would scarcely recognise the 
names of their old friends if they were whispered 
in their ears. Yet what a dehghtful home and 
family they were to be sure, though all were so 
unconventional and delightful that the more 
straitlaced townsfolk only received them on 
sufferance, and once nearly boycotted the whole 
family because of some imagined social lapse. 
I think the mother was even more remarkable 
than the father, but then I never liked him 
74 , 



TOWNSFOLK 

particularly, and to her I gave the love a young 
woman so often lavishes on another, who is 
very often the same age, if not older than her 
own mother ; and my friend was as old as Mama 
almost to a day. I recollect being the youngest 
married woman — indeed, almost the youngest 
woman — in the town, and feeling rather resentful 
at the manner in which I was always put with 
the elders. Alas ! I should now be the oldest 
old inhabitant if I returned, for one and all 
are dead; and when I do go back I feel as if I 
were a ghost among ghosts, there are so few 
left who even recollect a name that was familiar 
there for at least a hundred years. But all the 
fun of my first years was found in that delightful 
house in the North Street, which overflowed with 
boys and girls, and where the father and mother 
were one with the children, and lovers to the end. 
When they married first they lived out on the 
heath in a solitary cottage close to the clay- works 
where the Master's work lay, and my friend told 
me that she used to suffer agonies of fright during 
the hours she lived there alone with one young 
maid-servant. I think she had lived in a town 
in Wales, where her father was a well-known 
Unitarian minister ; at all events, she came from 
a full and bustling household, with much coming 
and going, and as she was married some little 
time before the children began to arrive she 
had many lonely hours. On one occasion she 
was standing looking out across the heath when 

75 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

some man came up the garden path and asked 
for the Master. She was in deadly terror lest 
he should turn out to be a malefactor, and replied 
very curtly ; on being pressed to say where he 
had gone, she fled indoors and locked herself in, 
when the man, failing to get any reply to his 
many knocks and rings, went away in a huff, 
and, much to her relief, disappeared. When the 
Master — as he was always called — returned, he 
was given a dramatic account of the day's alarms, 
and received it with much rage and despair. 
The man was a wealthy peer, much interested 
in clay works, and who, finding himself in the 
neighbourhood, had hoped to have an interview, 
from which much new business would have 
accrued. Determined never to make such a 
mistake again, the next visitor found himself 
asked in, pressed to wait, was given luncheon, 
and begged to remain for dinner. Imagine the 
tableau when the visitor turned out to be the 
tailor, anxious to display his new patterns and 
to obtain orders from a man whose garments at 
their best would have been scorned by a mechanic 
and at their worst were only fit for a rag-bag. 
I have never in all my life seen any man so 
absolutely indifferent to his apparel as was the 
Master. They gave a grand dinner-party when 
we were married, and we had to wait quite half 
an hour before he turned up. " Kept at the 
pits," said his wife. When he did come in he 
had on old grey trousers, clay-stained and torn, 
76 



TOWNSFOLK 

while his upper man was clad in the whitest and 
most beautiful shirt and new, clean, and correct 
coat and waistcoat and tie. Suddenly, when 
we were going down to dinner, the trousers caught 
his eye. He stopped half-way, rumpled up his 
shaggy locks in the way he used to affect when 
he was perplexed, then gazed at me in my 
bridal satin, and said "Lor'!" and finally pro- 
ceeded, being assured at the top of his wife's 
voice that dinner was more important than his 
raiment, and she considered herself lucky that 
he had even recollected to change the rest of his 
dress ! There was nothing the Master did not 
know or could not do, and his hands were as 
useful as his head. Once a frightful accident 
happened at the pits, and a man and a boy were 
entombed there alive for four whole days. It 
was he who used lengths of garden and brewery 
hose to pump air down to the miners while the 
digging was going on, and it was he who con- 
tinued in the same primitive manner to pass 
down food now and then. But it was an awful 
time. Men and women used to stream out across 
the Causeway to the pits, waiting in silence for 
news ; and when it came the Master was brought 
home shoulder-high, while the bells clashed out : 
the bells that are never allowed to ring now 
unless by the Rector's permission : which I for one 
think a pity, as no doubt do the ringers, whose 
earnings can be nothing like as much as they used 
to be in the good old times. The Master never 

n 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

left the side of the pits for the whole four days 
and nights. His food was taken to him there, 
he superintended the relays of workers, knocked 
so that the prisoners should know that they 
were being rescued as swiftly as might be, and 
finally, when the dazed, half-starved creatures 
were brought triumphantly to the surface, fed 
them himself with hot soup, until they were fit 
to be taken home once more. What wonder 
that there are still recollections of a service of 
thanksgiving on the Sunday afterwards at the 
pit-mouth, when Bibles were presented to the 
rescued men, and the beloved Rector preached 
from the text, " He brought me up from the 
miry pit." If in some vague manner the He 
meant to some of his hearers the Master, who 
was the worse ? The man returned to his labours 
at the pit, but the lad had had sufficient of them, 
and, making for the open sea, went for a sailor, 
where after long years he met his death, at any 
rate in the open, and not, as he expressed it, as 
a rat in a trap. 

In those days no town was ever so insanitary, 
so lacking every single thing it ought to have 
possessed, and the Master and his wife fought 
tooth and nail against all the wrongs they would 
fain have seen righted. But any rise in the rates 
gave the " city fathers " fits, and though the 
drainage was a mere matter of open gutters and 
cesspools; though when one person was buried 
in the fearsome and overcrowded churchyard 
7S 



TOWNSFOLK 

some one had to be dug up to make room for the 
newcomer; though there was no water-supply, 
and, indeed, none was obtained until two or 
three years ago; nothing could be done. The 
Master was allowed to talk, to plan baths and 
wash-houses, and an elaborate system of drainage 
yet to be carried out — for at present the old 
style still continues — and to storm about educa- 
tion and the closing of the churchyard as much 
as he liked. It was only when I got an old 
newspaper friend to call attention to the state 
of the churchyard in the Daily News that an 
inquiry was put on foot. Some one high in 
authority sought and found us out, the church- 
yard was abruptly closed, and the new cemetery 
consecrated as soon as possible. People who 
live nowadays have not the least idea of what 
really horrible things used to go on unchecked in 
distant country places, because there was no one 
to interfere, and few newspapers then cared to 
take upon themselves the somewhat invidious 
position of making a stir in matters that were 
not supposed to concern the world at large. The 
" gentry " amongst the townspeople had their 
terrible brick graves or still worse vaults ; they 
were safe of a resting-place ; but I shall never 
forget seeing bones with shreds of skin, and skulls 
with hair still on, dug up and cast on one side 
by the old sexton when a grave w^as required 
for one of our men's children. While a row of 
cottages that skirted the churchyard and drew 

79 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

their water from a well rather below the church- 
yard itself was the home of low fever, which in 
a hot season meant typhus, and even after the 
old churchyard was closed was cursed with an 
epidemic of diphtheria amongst the children. 
A pathetic patch in the new cemetery dotted 
with tiny crosses is spoken of as the diphtheria 
corner even at this day, when the " new ceme- 
tery " is full, and another field is about to be 
added to the over-full patch ! I was present 
at the beginning of this present year — 1908 — at 
the funeral of the very last of the old inhabitants, 
when she was laid to rest in the family brick grave 
in the old churchyard. I protest that the 
coffin-lid was not six inches below the surface of 
the ground, and though no doubt a large and 
heavy table-tomb is over her, the cottages still 
use the well-water, so perchance even now fever 
may return once more to its well-loved haunts 
of old ! How the Master used to rave against 
similar doings ! And I can see him as I write, 
his hat pushed to the back of his head, rubbing 
his forehead and ejaculating " Lor' ! " as he 
watched a new house being prepared for, the 
foundations being dug over one of the old 
" plague pits," where in the time of the plague 
bodies were cast in wholesale, let us hope into 
quicklime. Anyhow, the bones and skulls turned 
up in their hundreds, and were put back as the 
garden of the house was made. " An unlucky 
house that will be," said the superstitious. I 
80 



TOWNSFOLK 

have known, I think, four famihes hve there, 
and not one of them has had luck or happiness 
or anything else good in all the thirty odd years 
during which it has existed. I was much 
astonished, as I got to know the Master and his 
wife better and better, to observe how very, very 
superior they were to any one for miles around; 
and I was even more astonished to discover how 
little they were thought of, by the people who 
should have been their intimates. There was 
not a book she had not read ; she had more than 
a passing acquaintance with Hebrew, Greek, and 
Latin, and, moreover, German and French were 
to her as her native tongue ; she taught her own 
children, managed her household splendidly ; but 
how should her learning serve her ? She was a 
Unitarian ; both were Liberals ! Could there be 
any greater social crime in the country, I wonder, 
in the middle of the last century at any rate ? 
Those were not the days of Christian Science, 
but the Master had not the least belief in the 
ordinary medical practitioner, and nothing would 
induce him to allow one inside his doors. His 
children arrived comfortably with the assistance 
of himself and an old nurse ; he set his son's leg, 
and, regardless of the fact that he was lame 
until the day of his death, mended all the other 
fractures in the family, more or less successfully. 
He was only conquered by typhoid fever, caught 
in France ; not from the drainage he so heartily 
cursed at home; when he lost a most beautiful 
F 8i 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

daughter, who died because he had not the least 
idea that typhoid fever meant skilled nursing; 
and was only saved from the ignominy of an 
inquest because I happened to meet my dear 
old doctor and sent him straight into the sick- 
room, just in time to see the dear girl die 1 
Another daughter was ill too, but she was en- 
gaged to be married, her fiance's people demanded 
medical care for her, the fiances sister, a born 
nurse, took her in charge, and she was saved. 
But the Master never really recovered from 
the blow; it was the second child he had lost; 
the family removed to some little distance, and 
from that day to this the town has slowly 
perished, until there are only about four people 
left there who could by the utmost stretch 
of courtesy be called gentlefolk, and only two 
of these are old inhabitants. The others are 
migrants, clergy-folk, and doctors, and none of 
these remain any longer than they can possibly 
help. The Master and his brother were partners, 
but the younger brother was the richer man, 
and the sisters-in-law had the usual amusing 
feud, and it was difficult, I believe, to be friends 
with both households, but as the wife of the 
second brother was dead some time before I 
came on the scene, I had not to choose. If I 
had I should, I am sure, have selected the North 
Street household, and so have lost most valuable 
remembrances of delightful days. These two 
brothers always wore on Sundays to the day 
82 



TOWNSFOLK 

of their death regular evening coats and waist- 
coats. Some one suggested to me that these 
must have been the old-world " body coats " 
illustrated by " Phiz " in his pictures of Jonas 
Chuzzlewit, but I know they were not, as I 
have heard discussions in one household as to 
the age of the Sunday coat, and as to the pro- 
priety of its being relegated to evening wear, 
as it could no longer with due reverence bear the 
light of day. The younger brother always wore 
in church white cotton gloves, the fingers rather 
too long for him, but as I never went to the 
Unitarian chapel, save once when an entertain- 
ment and tea were given in the building, I do 
not know if the elder brother followed this weird 
fashion or not. 

It was the custom in those bygone days on 
Sunday to proceed straight from the different 
places of worship for a solemn walk round the 
walls, and here all religious differences were 
forgotten in the joy of seeing each other's Sunday 
garments, albeit we most of us knew them quite 
well by sight. Now no one walks round the 
walls, there is no one left to walk there; and 
I do not know a sadder sight than the church 
on Sunday : only about a dozen people are left 
who have been in the town anything like twenty 
years. I only call to mind two of the older men 
who were born there, while as one of these is 
a Unitarian he does not trouble church, though 
for some years his people went there, because 

83 



tFRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

there were not sufficient of their creed to attract 
any one to the chapel, which stands dereHct and 
silent, away from the silent street. If it is sad 
to see the death of a man, of a family, truly the 
death of a town is even more pathetic ; and when 
I remember the great families of boys and girls 
I used to know, and see their empty places, it 
is almost too much to bear. 

There was more waste in other lives : one girl, 
brilliantly clever, passably good-looking, un- 
controlled, uncontrollable, very fond of riding, 
intensely alive, yet gradually starved mentally 
until she ceased to care to live, and fell later on 
in life an easy victim to consumption. 

Hers was another typical family of the time ; 
the mother not very well educated, extremely 
pious, very narrow, very frightened of life and 
its possibilities, deadly terrified for her children's 
future, abjectly afraid of the strong, clever, 
sensual, successful man she had married, much 
against the wish of his family, who were dour 
Scots by descent and selfishly anxious to keep 
their brother to themselves. I just recollect 
her sitting in an arm-chair and reproving her 
elder daughter for raising the top skirt of my 
frock, a double-skirted arrangement made of silk, 
and of which I was very proud. She wanted to 
see if silk and not lining were to be found beneath 
the top skirt, and I have never forgotten 
my relief when she saw it was silk ; nor the 
manner in which her mother spoke of her rude 
84 



TOWNSFOLK 

ill-behaviour to a strange child. With the elder 
girl I never was " friends," but with the younger 
one I was, and we shared all our secrets, until 
we grew up ; then the life at school contrasted 
with her home-life had soured her : the gentle, 
patient mother was dead; the elder sister, cruel, 
unscrupulous, and determined to take what she 
could out of life, put her on one side as much 
as possible. She had " found out " her father, 
and her brothers married. Financial bothers 
had to be faced, and when she found funds did 
not allow of horses and charming dresses and 
silk stockings, she would have none of life, and 
was as wretched as she made every one who 
would have loved her if they could. Yet she 
too was brilliantly clever, humorous and witty; 
but when she returned from a most excellent 
school, and understood she could never ask her 
school-friends to see her in that divided house- 
hold, that she was expected to settle down to 
the regular routine of a small country town life, 
without any of the amenities that make country 
life bearable, she practically withered on her 
stem, and when her father died went away and 
died out of England among strangers, emanci- 
pated too late to enjoy a life that, placed in some 
other entourage, might have been a most happy 
and entirely useful one. 

In my day I think I liked the old rector and 
his wife and the beloved doctor as much as any 
one, and they too had had far more happenings 

85 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

in their families than one could have expected in 
such apparently commonplace lives. Of all the 
rector's enormous family not one is now alive : 
his girls, more fortunate than most, found kindly 
mates, lived slow and gentle lives, and died loved 
and lamented by all ; the sons — but every one 
knows how parsons' sons turn out as a rule ! 
I think two of the older ones lived creditably, 
but they were so much older than I that I never 
knew them; those I did are dead. Let them 
rest in peace. I at least do not intend to disturb 
their bones. 

How can I picture the beloved doctor, whose 
loving care for me took me through many a 
hard hour of my existence, and whose loss to 
the town has never been replaced ? I have not 
the least doubt that his science was of the 
smallest, and his knowledge was not great, but 
his patience, kindness, and sweetness are most 
fragrant, and are memories which I for one hope 
to retain as long as I breathe and live. 

He, too, had famous men among his people : 
admirals who had sailed the seas, and soldiers who 
had fought in the wars; and his sons took their 
part too in the world's work ; but tragedy came 
to his home twice : once his sister met and 
married a fascinating man, and returned home 
with her son. A first wife had turned up, she 
and her son had no right to the name they bore, 
and they remained at home. Gradually folk 
thought she was a widow, and I do not think 
86 



TOWNSFOLK 

the son ever knew he had no right to his father's 
name. Another tragedy, too, was the later part 
of the second wife's Ufe; but she was tended by 
her step-daughter lovingly, unselfishly. They are 
all dead now, and I question much if nowadays 
one could put one's hand on such brave, silent, 
and most unselfish folk. 

Then there were other doctors, one beloved of 
all the young women, who wept aloud when he 
left, and was so impervious to their charms and 
their prospects that all believed he had a secret 
wife and family elsewhere. Then a feud arose, 
and some of the townsfolk brought in a new 
doctor, but naturally he could not live out of 
them. The County stuck by the older man, who, 
moreover, held the appointments, and so the 
newcomer was speedily starved out. There were 
one or two who were horrid, one or two who were 
worse than horrid, and one who came for but a 
short time, whose cross and disagreeable wife kept 
us all at arm's length. Alas ! she was neither 
cross nor disagreeable ; she was dying silently and 
sadly of cancer, while her husband " gallivanted " 
about, and finally brought great scandal on one 
honoured name. That the scandal was more 
imaginary than real mattered little ; the wife 
died, and he went away, and was replaced by a 
wild and passionate man, of whom people talk 
with bated breath even unto this very day. 

One of the houses, now turned into a shop, 
was built before the reign of Charles II., and has 

87 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

the quaint little powdering closets out of the two 
best bedrooms, and, moreover, used to possess in 
its garden the most magnificent mulberry-tree I 
ever saw ; better than our own, and that was 
beautiful enough for any one. The paths were 
bordered with the bones from calves' feet, used 
in making jelly for the poor, and when I knew the 
house it was lived in by the most charming old 
lady I have ever known. I recollect sitting in 
her window one afternoon when it was snowing, 
and she told me how, on a similar afternoon, she 
had sat there waiting for her bridegroom. She 
was to be married the following day, and the 
licence had not come from the surrogate. Her 
fiance and his brother had driven off in a gig to 
get it ; they got stuck in a snow-drift, and they 
only returned the next day, just in time for the 
ceremony to be performed. She was married in 
her riding habit, and rode away on her honeymoon 
towards London, where she spent the first few 
years of her married life, pining always for her 
country home, where, fortunately, she soon re- 
turned, and remained until within a year or two 
of her death. She furthermore told me that as 
a child she well recollected the last funeral that 
took place at night, and how frightened she was 
as she watched it from a " porch-room " — i.e., the 
room built out over the porch in some of the old 
houses — as it climbed up " Martin's Pitch " and 
the flickering torches just showed the hearse and 
the long procession of mourners, for all the great 
88 



TOWNSFOLK 

people used to be buried after dark about that 
time. Another funeral she spoke of was that of 
her grandmother ; she died at the old family 
house, with the tan-pits behind it, on the other 
side of the Causeway, and the snow was so deep 
that a road had to be cut out for the procession 
to the churchyard. When the service was just 
over some of the male mourners looked up ; a 
change had come in the weather, wild-fowl were 
coming up the river : one and all left the church- 
yard in a hurry and sought their guns, leaving 
the bearers and the clergyman to see that the 
grave was covered in decently and in order. 
Fortunately, there were no ladies to look after : 
women did not attend funerals in those days ; 
and I cannot help thinking they are better at 
home on such occasions even now. But oh, the 
mourning the unhappy victims were compelled 
to wear ! In many houses too the crape used to 
be picked off when the mourning was lightened, 
and cleaned and then rolled round glass bottles 
and kept in a wardrobe in readiness for the next 
death in the family ; a custom that always made 
me creep, and one I can but think it would have 
been well to have dispensed with, sooner than it 
was. 

Naturally there were two or three good ghosts 
in the old town, one a headless horseman, whose 
horse I have heard, but whose rider I have never 
seen, and another one, a sound as of dripping 
water on a bedroom floor. Here had been laid 

89 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

the body of a drowned youth, and the sound of 
the water dripping from his garments was ever 
afterwards heard on a particularly still and quiet 
night. One most excellent ghost was at my 
aunt's house, and that one had the sense to walk 
up and down the verandah when it rained, keep- 
ing to the drive on fine nights in a most curious 
manner. Unfortunately, some one learned in 
the science of acoustics came to see us, and 
illustrated how the ghost was made by the 
trotting of horses on the Causeway : in fine 
weather the sound was thrown back a certain 
distance only, from Redcliffe; in wet weather 
it reached the verandah; and so our valuable 
ghost was laid. I wonder if the bats still inhabit 
an old stump of a tree that used to stand by the 
verandah. I was not afraid of the ghost, but I 
must confess the bats then and always sent me 
nearly mad with the most abject fright ! 



90 



CHAPTER IV 

MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

In my time there were four or five old maids 
still living who were even more " waste " than 
those who were qualifying to fill their places 
when they had departed this life. For while the 
second generation had gone away to school, and 
had even penetrated to London more than once, 
their immediate predecessors had done neither, 
and I have yet to discover how they obtained 
their education. I think; though the idea of 
Roman Catholicism was even worse than that of 
Dissent; that more than one fugitive French- 
woman had found a meagre home in the neigh- 
bourhood, and, concealing the fact of their 
adherence to the Scarlet Woman and the Pope 
of Rome, had given instruction to some of the 
families, whose latest members were quite old 
ladies when I was a girl. For the four or five 
I knew spoke French with a charming accent, 
and had delicate ways of embroidering that they 
could never have learned save from an inhabi- 
tant of France, while their knowledge of the finer 

91 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

parts of cookery had never been obtained at 
their mothers' knees. Their cookery was plain, 
soHd, and wholesome, but nothing else. Soup 
took pounds of meat to make, and was looked 
on as fearful waste save and except when a 
dinner-party was in the air; and it was from a 
servant trained under one of these French-taught 
women that I learned the component parts of 
the many vegetable soups I always use, and 
which are as economical as they are undoubtedly 
pleasant to consume. 

It is sad to remember these starved lives, for 
before they withered entirely the brains they 
originally possessed softened or wore out, and I 
can still recollect the gaunt, black-robed figures 
slipping about the streets, generally at dusk, 
with strained eyes and worn features, never doing 
anything particular, anything singular, but ap- 
parently looking for the good times they might 
have had and which had never come their way. 
One small lady, so precise and tidy she resembled 
nothing so much as an extremely neat doll, had 
quarrelled with every separate religious denomi- 
nation in the place, and had started a private 
creed of her own, and I was much interested in 
her, as I always was, and indeed am, in any one who 
is in the least degree out of the common. She 
endeavoured to explain it all to me, but I never 
could understand it, but as one of the principles 
of her belief consisted in worshipping in an 
" upper chamber " I think she must have assimi- 
92 



MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

lated unconsciously some of the tenets of the 
Plymouth Brethren. She lived in a house with 
a bow-window, which had a square of gravel and 
some railings between it and the street, and woe 
betide the youth or maiden who dared to swing 
on those railings. She was out of the window in 
an instant armed with a stick, which was capable of 
giving quite a hard rap should the delinquent be 
caught. But the children soon got to know her, 
and kept away. In later years the house fell 
from its high estate and became a shop, as, indeed 
did the house where the old lady was born — why 
I cannot think. It had been the doctor's house 
for generations, but never in my time, though it 
has in a measure kept to its traditions, as it is 
sacred to medicine still as a chemist's shop. 

Yet more waste was to be found in one of the 
oldest and most charming houses in the town, 
which had been the old Priory before the Refor- 
mation, and a passage from which led straight 
into the church and up into the " priest's room," 
which, however, was not discovered at the time 
of which I am writing. For the church, having 
been " restored " in the early Victorian days, was 
in a delightful state of gloom and muddle, albeit 
I honestly prefer it to the present condition of 
hideous varnished pitch-pine and cleanliness, 
which may be more hygienic, but has not one 
ounce of interest left, at all events in the body of 
the church. And though the passage was known 
about and had its entrance duly blocked up, the 

93 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

priest's room was only found later on, and is now, I 
think, used as a storage house for old decorations 
and sexton's tools and general untidy odds and 
ends. But when I first knew the Priory I loved 
all who lived there. There was a dehghtful 
brother engaged to one of my pretty aunts, who 
had the bluest eyes and the greyest hair I ever 
saw ; with him I first visited the Fair, and while 
I clung to him tightly in mingled fear and wonder 
at the sights and sounds, I loved him so abjectly 
that when he died abroad of rapid consumption 
my aunts never dare tell me for years that he 
was gone. I had cried myself ill when he left 
England : what should I do when I heard I 
should never see him again ? The last time I 
saw him I was not a day more than nine, and 
it was just after the Fair, but I have only to close 
my eyes to see his beautiful blue ones look into 
my childish orbs, and his kind hand that gave me 
a funny little white china and gilt coach, the top 
of which opened and held pins, and which I kept 
for over forty years, and only lost in one of our 
numerous moves. But I still possess the Words- 
worth he gave me to remember him by, for he said 
the coach might break. 1 wanted no remem- 
brance save the one I shall always keep ; all the 
same I am glad I have my Wordsworth, and that 
that poet and dear William together first gave 
me my real love of poetry and the countryside. 
Fairs have so long ceased to be worthy of the 
name that I will here describe the one I and 
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MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

William went to fifty years ago. The town was 
built in the shape of a cross, and had four wide 
streets called after the different points of the 
compass. On each side of North and South 
Streets were erected booths, and here were sold 
the most fascinating toys : wooden balls painted 
to resemble striped red and yellow tulips, which 
unscrewed and disclosed the fact that they en- 
closed, one after the other, more tulip-balls, until 
the last one was the size of a pea and did not 
unscrew. Other similarly painted toys did not 
enclose balls, but held minute tea-sets and wooden 
soldiers, which were even more fascinating than 
the tulip-balls. The whips were a great feature, 
as were the wide leather aprons sold at the same 
booth; and vast stores of china were heaped 
about ; while a special make of ginger-bread called 
" jumbles " was to be had then and at no other 
time, and woe betide that husband and father 
who did not bear home to his family a vast 
paper bag full to the brim of the delicious things. 
I think the noise was something almost unbeliev- 
able ; every man and woman was shouting out 
the merits of his or her wares ; there were 
enormous piles of cabbages and great heaps of 
salt cod ; while even the staid tradesfolk of the 
town had stalls and displayed the " latest 
fashions " from the county town before the ad- 
miring eyes of the women and girls, whose one 
holiday for the year it was, and who purchased 
at the Fair in September the raiment for the 

95 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

coming season. It was interesting, too, to hear 
the denizens of the different heath-set farms or 
villages greet each other and ask for the year's 
news, while sweethearts met, pushed each other, 
giggled and guffawed, and otherwise proved their 
attachment before the eyes of their friends. 

But awful as the noise in the streets was, it 
was nothing to that on the space sacred to the 
shows and merry-go-rounds, known as St. John's 
Hill by those who lived there and wanted to 
be genteel, and as the Saw-pits by the oldest 
inhabitants, for no sawing had been done there 
for years, or as the pig-market by the farmers, who 
sold their animals there when there was no fair 
on hand. When there was they had to go farther 
afield, out by the walls and near the workhouse. 
Traffic was impossible while the fair raged ; 
horses could be led through in the day-time 
despite the shouts and the cracks of the " penny- 
a-shot " booths, but no horse would face the 
Fair after dark. Great flares of paraffin and tow 
lighted up the booths ; I fear all the men were 
not sober ; anyhow, it was an imprudent driver 
who attempted to get out of the town save by a 
circuitous manner round the narrow back lanes. 

I wonder what has become of all the fearsome 
shows which were a matter of course fifty years 
ago. The fat lady whose fat was so real that 
folk were invited to pinch her and to see that 
her legs corresponded to her arms, for " she 
would now raise her dress as high as decencv 
96 



MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

would permit " — about an inch above a very, 
very stout ankle, clad in a dirty white stocking, 
very much rucked and disappearing into a side- 
springed cloth boot; the awful Kaffir who ate 
live rats ; the wondrous beasts, mostly stuffed and 
manufactured at home out of two or more skins ; 
and the " blood and thunder " actors and actresses, 
who shouted and strutted about a very narrow 
and rickety stage, and begged every one to come 
in and see the play, which was always just about 
to begin. Join to this the yells and screams of 
the girls and boys, who were either riding round 
and round on the wooden horses or tossing in the 
swing-boats to the sound of a wheezing organ, 
and you can imagine how much sleep the residents 
on St. John's Hill were likely to obtain until the 
fair closed. 

The horses were worked by hand in those days, 
and the swings were managed in the same way ; 
now a dreadful puffing engine is added to the 
racket; but so few fairs are left that one is in- 
clined to put up with these relics simply for the 
sake of the dear and noisy days that are no more. 

Our fair was nothing like as important as one 
held a few days later in the year, and which was 
really stupendous. It took place on the top of a 
hill, and horses and sheep were its main products, 
though in early days housewives used to buy 
and exchange great rolls of cloth and linen, all 
home-made, for the spinning-wheel was still in 
evidence fifty years ago. Gloves and buttons were 
G 97 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

also staple industries, and I am glad to see that 
there is an attempt to revive this latter manu- 
facture. All the same, no village industry can 
be anything save a " culte " ; machinery has cut 
out all the home industries; and if the machine- 
made goods do not wear, they are so cheap that one 
can easily replace them when they are shabby. 

At the horse-fair it was an astute man who 
could buy an animal that was worth taking home, 
and I well recollect the dismay of one of the 
local " gentry " who, distrusting his coachman 
and believing very much in his own knowledge of 
horseflesh, went to the fair and brought back, 
at a vast increase in price, one of his own old 
horses which had been cast from his stable for 
incurable crib-biting. True, the creature had 
been carefully painted and given a couple of 
white stockings; but the coachman recognised 
his old enemy even before he was washed ; and 
the master, for the future, left the management 
of the stables in the coachman's hands. ■ 

The September fairs were always the most 
serious fairs ; the ones that came in April, which 
put out our fires and brought the cuckoo, were 
entirely pleasure fairs, though at one time they 
were hiring fairs, and even now on the 6th of April 
there is a vast migration all over the country 
of farm-labourers and their wives, families and 
goods. They are still hired for a year, and in 
early spring the local papers are vocal with cries 
of " Wanted, a labourer ; wife to milk and look 
98 



MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

after ' chicken ' ; with growing family preferred." 
But the cry often goes up in vain ; the growing 
family don't want to walk miles to school ; 
neither will they put up with the cottages, which 
would have been palaces to their grandparents, 
nor with the dulness and the never-ending work 
on a farm. 

But thinking of the fairs and my dear, kind 
old friend has taken me away from the townsfolk 
and from the rest of his family. He had then 
three sisters and a brother ; one sister was 
married, and his brother lived in London, and 
was much looked up to in consequence. The 
sisters' lives represented the " waste," especially 
one of them, who was clever, charming, nice to 
look at, and above all very highly educated, 
though how she managed to obtain her learning 
I for one never could find out. I only knew her 
when she was old, but even then she had the walk 
and figure of a girl, and as her hair never turned 
grey, and to the day of her death she wore it in 
curls, she used to be followed home by the giddy 
seaside tourists (for she ended her days by the 
sea), who were much surprised when she turned 
and faced them, and showed a face that bore 
all the lines of her more than seventy years. 
The two old sisters outlived every one of their 
relatives ; the London brother, not having made 
such a success of his life after all, came home to 
die ; and my dear old friend died quite suddenly 
and painlessly in her sleep, taking away with her 

99 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

all her unfulfilled hopes and wishes and her 
yearnings for a wider life. I cannot help thinking 
that had these women lived in the present time 
they would all have been heard of. Elizabeth 
would, I am sure ; her talk sparkled with wit. 
She was original and delightful, and it was a real 
pleasure to me to sit in her quaint upstairs 
drawing-room in the window overlooking the sea, 
and hear her talk on and on in a stream about 
her girlhood, her hopes, her thwarted ambitions, 
and her great love-trouble, which apparently 
brought her young days to a sudden close, but 
which never soured her at all. She was loyal 
to her lover to the last, and even loved the girl 
he preferred to her. " I had a sharp tongue and 
was foolish, I know," she said, " and, of course, 
Mary was sweet and good." She might have 
added that Mary had money, but she never did, 
and simply blamed herself for the disgraceful 
way in which she had been openly and coolly 
jilted in those bygone years. I do not think 
her sister ever could have had a love-story, for 
she at any rate was the plainest woman I ever 
saw. She outlived Elizabeth; and now the dear 
little eyrie of a cottage perched high in a nook 
in the cliff is " improved " and " enlarged," and 
no one recollects the family, though at one time 
they were notable members of a society that has 
now entirely ceased to exist. 

There was also waste to be found among the 
men, but then in those days free living was 



MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

generally at the bottom of that. I recollect my 
aunt telling me that when she was first married : 
now, I suppose, more than fifty-six years ago : 
not one of the gentlemen was ever either willing 
or able to join the ladies after dinner. The 
women saw each other home ; if fine, with 
pinned-up skirts, goloshes on their feet, knitted 
shawls and clouds tied over their curls, and 
immense cloaks over all. If wet, they departed 
in relays in the " brougham from the Bear.'* 
The wretched brougham that always smelt of 
damp straw, and that once came to grief with 
us three miles from home, on a wet, wild night, 
when the south-west wind was raging over the 
hills, and we had to walk back in thin shoes and 
without umbrellas, wet to the skin, and vowing 
we would never trust ourselves to the treacherous 
vehicle again. It is long since gone on the 
scrap-heap, poor old carriage, but it was, even 
at its worst, a valuable thing. The rector was 
the only man who possessed anything like a 
closed carriage, and his was known as the " pill- 
box," as it would barely hold him and his wife, 
both thin and spare folk ; and there was in 
consequence great competition for the carriage ; 
while it was a mercy weddings were so rare in 
the town, and that funerals were always " walk- 
ing," else I do not know how either revellers 
or mourners would have ever reached the church. 
True, the town did once possess a hearse, and a 
gruesome story was told in reference to this. A 

TOI 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

very stout old gentleman had died and was to be 
buried, and, new to the ways of a hearse, the 
undertaker's men were puzzled how to get the 
coffin in. At last one of them climbed into the 
hearse itself, and, pulling at the coffin, placed it 
in position ; but as he found he could not get 
out, elected to remain where he was until the 
short drive was over. The funeral started, and 
presently the man gave a long, loud sneeze. The 
driver had no idea that anything save the coffin 
was in the hearse ; he gave one stupendous yell, 
started off his horses at a hand-gallop, and could 
scarcely be stopped before he had gone some 
way out of the town. 

The man who was being buried was one of the 
victims of the prevailing habit of tippling, and 
he left his old daughters quite unprovided for ; 
they were just not ladies, but too " genteel " to 
go out to service or do any real hard work. So 
they were started in one of those pathetic shops 
which were once common enough, but that now 
have quited ceased to exist, where Berlin wool, 
beads, fancy-work, and children's books and toys 
were to be purchased, and where, behind the 
counter, were rows of shelves filled with dusty 
dead books, which ought to have been buried 
long ago, which no one read, or even wanted to 
read, and which were dignified by the name of 
the Circulating Library. We all subscribed a 
guinea a year for years, but I never had a single 
book, and I never heard of any one either who 

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MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

ever did. The sisters managed a newspaper 
and magazine club, and we used to pay a 
penny a week to see the Illustrated News and 
the Queen, and another penny to see Cornhill, 
Macmillan, and Temple Bar, and I think the 
Argosy. Some people paid more and had the 
Sunday at Home and Good Words, but I did 
not feel equal to this, and, pleading poverty, 
declined subscribing to the more godly maga- 
zines. " If only she were a Christian I could 
love her," said one old lady when she heard 
that I did not take in the Sunday magazines, 
and she shook her head despairingly ; but I 
existed comfortably without her love, though 
she little knew how much she added to the gaiety 
of my existence. For she at any rate was not 
" waste." She was absolutely pleased with 
herself in every relation in life, and if her severe 
attitude towards Sunday drove her far more jovial 
spouse to secret pipes and drinks in the barn, 
she never knew. Those who did pitied him and 
kept their counsel, for they were quite aware 
that no one can lead a man a harder life than 
your real old-fashioned good woman, who is so 
intent on saving her own soul and living up to 
the letter of the law that she forgets religion need 
not be dismal and that one can be good and 
amusing at one and the same time. It was her 
habit to go through the house the last thing on 
Saturday evening, in the same manner that 
orthodox Jews search for crumbs of leavened 

103 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

bread before the Passover, to collect and clear 
away every book, paper, or magazine that 
savoured of the world. Then her needlework 
was as carefully folded and put away; and I 
have known her unfortunate husband proceed to 
church with a pin at the back of his collar, 
because the button came off just as they were 
starting, and nothing on earth would allow her 
to sew it on, or even permit her handmaiden 
to do so either. A crack shot, a jovial, good- 
looking man was the husband, excellent company 
and most entertaining when one had him by 
himself ; but he was literally dragooned by his 
wife. He was as old as my father, but when 
he showed a distinct fondness for me, and used 
to let me ride with him round his farm, a thing 
I always loved to do with any one, she disinterred 
her habit, laid by for at least twenty years, and 
came out to chaperon us, her habit gently 
sweeping the ground and much bewildering the 
old horse, which had not been ridden for years, 
and was generally humbly engaged at the plough. 
That habit would have comfortably made four 
nowadays, but she only donned it once, for on 
reflection she thought that we might both be 
trusted ; and in after years she confessed to me 
that only once had she had real cause for suffering 
in her married life, and when she went farther 
and " named names " I was able to assure her 
that even then her fears were groundless. The 
damsel was a bold and flirtatious imp who had 
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MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

openly boasted that before she went home she 
would kiss every man in the place. It was not 
her fault that she did not succeed, and that the 
husband fell an easy prey to her wiles was more 
the fault of his pious wife than that he had any 
intention of forgetting his duty. " But when 
a pretty girl asks one to kiss her, what is one to 
do ? " he said pathetically. "Do it and tell," 
said I ; and my advice turned out rightly, though 
the free and open confession appeared to be 
merely a blind, and caused the anguish at which 
she and I laughed, when I was able to inform 
her I had egged him on to do the deed. 

Religion never took on a worse guise to me than 
when it was donned by this individual. A parson 
was a saint, a creed a fetish to which one and 
all were sacrificed. She had a vein of hardness 
that bore her unhurt through many a fiery 
trial. Her only child died ; he was nearer to her 
dead, she wrote, than he had ever been when 
living ; she would have adopted his fiancee, but 
she elected to marry some one else on the anni- 
versary of his death. " So sweet of her," said 
the mother ; and she would have had the child 
of the marriage call her grandmother, but the 
husband had a sense of fitness or humour 
and declined the honour, much to her amazement, 
for she had really looked on the girl as her 
daughter, and could not believe that she was 
nothing of the kind. 

My idea of Sunday-keeping is always to ensure 

105 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

a day's rest of some sort or other to all with 
whom I have to do ; but the literal interpretation 
was the only one this worthy couple could bear 
of the Second Commandment, and when I per- 
sisted in going for a drive on a Sunday afternoon, 
the time when, as a rule, the good Sabbatarian 
used to retire to his barn, pipes, and whisky, he 
made a solemn call on me and begged me to 
cease to offend. Fortunately his exposition of 
my duty was interrupted by an earthquake — 
a real, bona-fide earthquake — and we were both 
so astonished that we fled different ways to 
investigate what appeared to me to be some one 
walking with very heavy footsteps in the room 
overhead, where no one could at that moment 
possibly be. It was a very curious experience ; 
no one was in the house, yet first of all these very 
heavy feet sounded over our heads, and as I 
made for the kitchen all the plates on the dresser 
were shaking, the doors burst open, and all down 
the remarkably dirty lane that led to our house 
the cottage doors had come open too, though they 
were one and all safely locked up, as the owners 
were all out on their usual Sunday stroll. Naturally 
we had none of us the least idea of what it was ; 
first we imagined something must have blown 
up, albeit we knew there was nothing to blow up 
within miles, and it was only when the newspaper 
arrived next day and described our earthquake, 
though not in the least as it had happened, that we 
realised what had actually occurred. 
io6 



MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

There were three men in the town at the time 
when I was very young who were most extra- 
ordinary studies, and who certainly could not exist 
at the present day. They were sons of one of 
those remarkable lawyers who in the latter part 
of the eighteenth and very early years of the 
nineteenth centuries appeared to be more like 
spiders than anything else, and only lived to spin 
webs in which one after the other their victims 
became entangled, until their property was 
absorbed and the victims, sucked dry, were 
sent adrift to manage as best they could for 
themselves. The father of these three men, 
dead long years before I was born, had so 
managed his affairs that he owned no less 
than three, and it may have been four, small 
manors, which had all been in the hands of 
different members of the County. I have not 
the least doubt that he obtained all he had by 
absolutely righteous means ; he never spent one 
shilling where a penny would do ; he never 
spent anything on himself or his family, and he 
never went away or took the least holiday, while 
the jovial, hard-riding, hard-drinking small squires 
had never denied themselves a thing and borrowed 
until every acre they possessed was mortgaged 
to the hilt, and then were bitterly enraged when 
the day of reckoning came, as come it must, 
and the manors which had been in their families 
since the Conquest passed for ever away from 
them into alien hands. 

107 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

On one of these small manors this lawyer lived, 
a small, meagre creature, with a smaller, more 
meagre wife, who, report says, kept herself in 
clothes and food on the rabbits that swarmed all 
over the place. A couple of rabbits fetched a 
shilling, so it took a good many to provide 
her with a gown ! I often wish I could have 
known these people ; they sounded so truly 
interesting ; but their children were old when I 
was young, and I have only tradition to repeat. 
They had an enormous family, reduced to the 
three sons and some daughters in my time, two 
of whom were the gaunt women in black who 
used to glide about the streets after dark. Of 
the three sons only one was reputable; the other 
two were the reverse. One died of drink ; the 
other drank most frightfully ; the stage at which 
he had arrived being marked by the number of 
pairs of spectacles mounted on his nose ; but 
he read every book that he could get hold of, 
and knew everything on every possible subject 
one could name. He must have had a store of 
strength, too, behind his love of drink, for, some 
one having presumed to taunt him with his 
failing, he cast down his glass in the bar of the 
inn and with a round oath swore he would never 
take another drop. He lived for some years after- 
wards, and was never anything but a strict 
teetotaler all that time. I remember him too, 
a fearsome figure, mopping and mowing in his 
cups about the streets, which he walked up 
io8 



MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

in a curious curtseying manner, as if he were 
acknowledging salutations. He would follow his 
respectable relations and mutter in their ears, 
claiming cousinship with those who would fain 
have forgotten his existence; but all the same 
once he became sober he it was who turned his 
back on his cousins, and he died as he had lived, 
very much alone. 

The old house that provided the rabbits was 
the proud possessor of a real ghost, and past it 
the coach of the De Turbervilles, immortalised 
by Thomas Hardy, used to be driven. It 
entered at one gate, hurried along the rough road 
that led to the house, then went helter-skelter 
round the circular drive and out at another gate, 
on a road that led straight to the family burial- 
place at " Kingsbere." One day I and one of 
my sisters-in-law were driving along this road ; 
presently she said, " Draw the ponies aside ; 
there's something coming." I drew the ponies 
to the hedge and looked round. A whirl of dust, 
accompanied by the clanking of chains and the 
tramping of horses, seemed to rush by us, but 
we could see nothing. " The De Turberville 
coach ! " gasped Alice. I, more prosaic, looked 
over the hedge ; there was a plough at work in 
a very dusty field on the other side. I fancy 
that accounted for the ghost, though naturally 
we both preferred to think we had literally been 
passed by the uncanny thing. 

There seemed no special luck about that place, 

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FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

for the next people who came there were most 
extraordinary, and to this day a pleasing mystery 
hangs about them. The husband was goodness 
and kindness itself, but in his youth he must 
have gone far afield to look for his wife. When 
I first knew her she was quite beautiful ; she 
had the most exquisite complexion and hair 
I ever saw, the latter deep, dense black, and 
coiled round and round her small and shapely 
head ; and until she spoke you would have thought 
her an old-fashioned duchess — not an American 
one — at least. But directly she began to speak 
malapropisms fell broadcast from her Hps. " I 
hear you are a very littery woman," she remarked 
to a friend ; and at a party given in our honour 
she came in a handsome velvet dress, but with 
no less than three separate rows of frilling rising 
one above the other where the ordinary tucker 
should have been. Moreover, at that same 
party, when the man offered her wine she com- 
manded him to leave the bottle ; when she further 
put the whole of a partridge on her plate and 
ate it ; while I looked on amazed and wondered 
what on this earth she would do next ! At her 
own house I have seen her demolish a whole 
pheasant and keep us waiting while she cracked 
and ate the contents of a dish full of nuts ; but 
as, on the last occasion I dined there, she rose 
and re-dressed her hair in the middle of the 
feast, we thought something must be the matter ; 
and soon she departed, and with her passed away 
no 



MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

one of the few joys of my existence. For one 
never quite knew what she would do next. She 
used to clatter into the town on horseback, her 
hair flying in the breeze, she herself clad in a 
habit made of Rob Roy plaid, and followed by 
the coachman puffing and grunting on one of 
the big carriage horses ; while on Sundays her 
conduct was quite extraordinary. She would 
suddenly throw her handkerchief into the corner 
of her pew and chase it ; her audible comments on 
the sermon must have somewhat embarrassed 
the good old rector ; but after she came in white 
muslin on a Christmas Day, with flowers in her 
hair, she never came again, and the fond hope 
I entertained that she would seize and bear off 
the enormous chignon worn by the lady in front 
of her was never fulfilled. Though she still 
continued more or less on view, she never again 
entered the " sacred edifice." At one picnic 
she distinguished herself by bringing a large 
quantity of food and consuming it by herself 
alone, never speaking to a soul ; and after she 
had concluded the feast she solemnly walked 
into the sea, dipped her handkerchief into it, 
and washed herself all over in salt water ; and 
when she emerged, dripping, she made a hole in 
her handkerchief, attached it to her parasol, and 
walked up and down in the sunshine until she 
and the handkerchief alike were dry. I cannot 
imagine why she was left to do these things, or 
why, save as an amusement, we did not recognise 

III 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

that she must be out of her mind ; but I for 
one did not. I put all she did down to her 
country entourage and her evident lack of 
birth or breeding ; and I was much surprised 
to hear what was really the matter, and that 
soon after my last " call " she had gone away. 
On that call I found her surrounded by a mass 
of the billowy petticoats of the day, which she 
was converting into window curtains, and she 
took me upstairs to see her morning's work. She 
had cut up her velvet dress and nailed it down in 
strips as a carpet for her bedroom ; her husband 
did not think a new one was wanted, and this was 
her revenge on him ! She was holding forth volubly 
to me on the subject when the husband appeared, 
showed me gently, but plainly, that he wanted me 
to go, and when he put me into the carriage he 
told me in a very few words what was the matter, 
and that for the future calls were neither to be 
made nor returned. I fancy the silence and deadly 
dulness of the place, the lack of resources in her- 
self, and her inability to become one with her hus- 
band's family or friends had a good deal to do with 
her sudden collapse. She was most impatient of 
control, and I have often wondered if she did not 
begin her eccentricities as a protest against her 
stodgy neighbours, finally continuing them under 
the influence of drink or drugs until they over- 
mastered her in a way that could never have 
happened had she been in a more civilised 
and amusing part of the world. Anyhow, she 

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MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

was an engaging if painful study, and I have 
never forgotten her, for that would be quite 
impossible. 

How many curious people have passed through 
that corner of the world in the long years that 
I have known it ! — people whose life-histories 
would make novels in themselves ; people who 
took biggish houses and posed as " County " 
and were more or less swindlers of a blatant 
type. Some turned out to be wanted by the 
police, and might still be wanted had they 
remained there ; but, becoming bold after a 
sojourn among the heather and the hills, and 
most likely bored as well, they came out of 
hiding and were caught just as they hoped every 
one had forgotten all about their crimes and 
their existences. Just after the end of the 
American war a man who had made a large 
fortune in running the blockade with cotton 
ships came to one of the big houses which even 
then were " to let furnished," and he too was 
extraordinary, and I think petered out in a very 
peculiar way. I once stayed for a couple of 
days with him and his wife in the lovely place, 
where there was a hedge of camellia trees more 
than six feet high, which blossomed freely in 
the open air. I was much too young — only 
about sixteen or so — to understand all about 
them ; but they soon left the place and dis- 
appeared, to be followed by still more remarkable 
people, who also in due time vanished, leaving 
H 113 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

piles of bills behind them, some of which have 
never been paid until this day. 

There are two very curious sides to life in a 
country place that have never yet been spoken 
of. One is the manner in which, by a judicious 
boycott, succeeded by still more judicious hints 
and winks of the kind of " I would an I could " 
style, a woman's social life may be entirely 
wrecked and she herself turned from a harmless 
if somewhat unpleasant or foolish nonentity into 
a disgrace to her whole sex. I often recollect 
a remark Miss Broughton once made : "I think 
if the big house knew how much misery it could 
inflict on the small house by either snubs or 
patronage, the big house would recognise how 
horrible such conduct is, and discriminate 
more than it does at present " ; and I am 
perfectly sure a truer remark was never made. 
In much later days and in a different county I 
once came across such a bright and delightful 
little creature, pretty, charming, clever; yet no 
one knew who she was, who her forebears had 
been. Her husband was rich, but not a good 
man ; he would have been accepted quickly 
enough, for one knew who he was, and he had 
money. But whispers ran round about the wife ; 
suggestions were made ; she was ignored, cut, 
left out of everything. The husband turned and 
rent her for what was as much his fault as any- 
thing; and finally she ran away and left him 
to his own devices. Of course, said rumour, 
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MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

there was a man. There certainly was not, 
until her husband filled her place, and behaved 
so abominably that she, broken in health and 
spirits and pocket, looked round for help and 
found it, just where she should have done 
nothing of the kind. 

Another case, in which — alas ! that I should 
have to confess it — I joined in heartily, for I 
loathed the unfortunate creature, resulted equally 
disastrously; and if she, in the shipwreck that 
ensued, drew down others into the whirlpool 
who can blame her ? Certainly not I, who, had 
I my time to go over again, would most decidedly 
behave far differently in every possible way. 

Another feature that can only be noted by 
those who live to a respectable age is the manner 
in which an obscure and often enough unpleasant 
family slowly but surely climbs to an eminence 
that finally entitles them to be considered in the 
light of county folk. It is only those who are 
well on in years and have excellent memories 
who remember what was and contrast it with 
what is, and are much entertained and amused at 
the development ! It was after a long absence 
that I last revisited the town, or rather the neigh- 
bourhood, to find one family, scouted by all when 
it arrived in the place, turned into the hub of the 
wheel ! Round them all that was left of society 
revolved ; snubbed, scarcely spoken to years 
and years ago by the townsfolk, they now took 
small notice of those who had snubbed them. 

"5 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

Money, a thick hide, a demonstrative attachment 
to the Church — albeit they had been Baptists 
until they started their carriage — and a strong 
conservative policy had brought them well to 
the front, and at the time I speak of they were 
" in " with every one, and had even been bold 
enough to divide their entertainments into two 
sorts or kinds : one for the townsfolk and similar 
humble creatures, and one for the " County," 
or rather for those who appear to be what the 
County once was. Well ! all their old friends 
were dead and gone away. Perhaps they were 
right to buy what they could never have earned ; 
all the same it is amusing to look on and recollect 
how the letter H used to fly and the grammar fly 
too, while we of the town condescended to speak 
to them, and even liked to go to the large and 
startling gatherings at their house. This only 
amuses when one does not care ; it hurts when 
those who were once one's well-loved playmates 
pass on one side, inflated by riches, living in a 
higher atmosphere, forgetting the good old days 
when all were young, happy, and gay together : 
the good old days of one's youth, which even in 
the country had their bright spots, and certainly 
had very amusing moments at any rate. 

One more of the townsfolk may be mentioned 
before passing on to another subject, as she 
most certainly was of a type that is now entirely 
extinct. She had been the housekeeper to an 
old man, one of three brothers, who had all owned 
ii6 



MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

small manor-farms about eight or nine miles 
away from the town. These old men were all 
hardened bachelors, until their housekeepers 
persuaded two of them to marry them. One of 
these housekeepers became a widow ; everything 
was left to her. She sold the manor, which had 
been in the family since 14 — , and came to live 
in the town with her old servant, who was 
popularly supposed to be her sister, although I 
do not really think she was anything of the kind. 
Old Mrs. S. was the most sought-after woman 
in the whole place. Relations of the husband 
lived there, and all, with one exception, paid 
humble court to her whenever they could. I 
recollect her perfectly well : tall, thin, scornful, 
hard, shrewd: what adjective of a similar nature 
cannot be applied to her, I wonder ? As a child 
my aunt took me to have luncheon with her; 
amongst other things we had apple tart. Will 
it be believed when I say that we were bidden 
to carefully put aside the cloves used to flavour 
it by the side of our plates, as she told us 
quite calmly that she always used them again ? 
She was pained and surprised when I left my 
share of the pie and never went there again on 
any pretext whatever. When I was married 
I had heard her story, and utterly declined to 
join her court; she might keep her ill-earned 
gains for me ; and she used to scowl over 
her wire blinds at me whenever I went by. 
But her will had been made the moment she 

117 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

had anything to leave, and all went to her own 
relations, most of whom lived in shops in the 
town. Her husband's never benefited at all; 
and as the date of the will proved it was made 
long before she had any acquaintance among 
them, I was rather rejoiced to recollect the 
homage that had been paid her, and that never 
brought them one sixpence for all their trouble. 
It is annoying to think of those three delightful 
little estates and old houses ; one of them at 
least might have come our way, but none ever 
did ; all are in alien hands ; and I even think 
the houses are pulled down or turned into farm- 
houses, or even cottages. Many of the beautiful 
old manor-houses in " the island " are fallen from 
their old estate, and serve as houses for humble 
folk, and any one in search of a residence with 
a history could not do better than buy one of 
these ; they could be easily made liveable in, 
and how glad the houses themselves would be 
to have gentlefolks within their walls once more ! 
For I verily believe that a house is a sentient 
thing and absorbs some of the personality of its 
tenant. If that be so, how these old manors 
must suffer ! Dirty, unwashed, unkempt folk 
sleep in the stately old bedrooms; some of the 
parlours see no company save rats and mice, 
and are often enough used as storehouses for 
apples, odds and ends of cart harness, and other 
trifles ; while the gardens where fair ladies once 
walked are one mass of rubbish, where the paths 
ii8 



MORE TOWNSFOLK, AND OTHERS 

can hardly be traced, and where roughly tended 
fruit-bushes replace the lilies and roses of old. 
The front entrances are nailed up, and should 
one wish to penetrate into the place one struggles 
through a dairy or a wash-house, or even a 
kitchen, and has small idea of the really lovely 
rooms that are going to ruin as fast as they can. 
But the fate of the ancient manor-houses is too 
sad and their history too long to dwell on here. 
Yet the past still lingers around them, and no 
doubt sad ghosts wander in their deserted and 
desecrated rooms ! 



119 



CHAPTER V 

THE OLDEST INHABITANT 

Before I was married the oldest inhabitant Hved 
in a large square red-brick house in the centre 
of the town. The family then consisted of the 
father and mother and one daughter ; but I 
knew very little indeed of the father, who died 
some time in the 'sixties, and the mother and 
daughter were always my great friends, in a 
measure at any rate. I can just recollect the 
old gentleman, very trim, precise, and sharp- 
spoken, a typical country lawyer of the old school, 
very fond of a glass, and of excursions outside 
the narrow path of virtue ; for though his 
immediate relations knew nothing of it, there 
are yet elderly folk who could, if they would, 
claim relationship to one of the most exclusive 
of the narrow-minded denizens of a small country 
town of fifty years ago. It was from one of their 
windows that I watched, with delight and fear, 
an election ; but when I went to live in the place 
the old gentleman was dead ; his affairs were 
found in a fine state of confusion, and the mother 

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THE OLDEST INHABITANT 

and daughter and their old maid had migrated 
to a much smaller house, where they lived 
without ever moving away, even for a few days, 
until they both died. No one could comprehend 
why matters were in such a muddle ; he had 
held all the appointments in the town and had 
had the confidence of all the County famihes 
round. But I think the family, small as it was, 
had one and all helped to spend the income ; 
a carriage and pair, a large staff of servants, 
much expensive wine and good dinners, were 
all costly. Moreover, election-times brought in 
crowds ; rent audits and other large gatherings 
were held in the big red house ; and food was 
more expensive then than it is now, when most 
people eat sparingly and drink even less. 

I can just recollect the sale at the red house, 
and I only wish I had a catalogue of it. I was 
staying in the town at the time, but did not then 
take any interest in the splendid old china and 
furniture. But the debts were paid, and enough 
of both china and furniture was bought in for the 
widow and daughter; and when the tiny house- 
hold was dispersed early in 1908 the furniture 
alone sold for over a thousand pounds, while the 
small stock of rare ancient silver was dispersed 
at Christie's, and added perceptibly to the money 
brought in by the furniture sale. Unfortunately, 
the old china was much mended, or else it would 
have fetched a great deal more ; it looked all 
right on the shelves, but when it was taken down 

121 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

it was discovered that it was patched and glued 
together. All the same, it sold well. One small 
vase I personally always thought hideous brought 
in ten guineas ; it was resold the same day in 
one of the inns of the town for twenty pounds ; 
but the man who bought it sat down upon it in 
the station 'bus, and so in less time than it takes 
to tell it the poor vase was reduced to powder, 
and in such a way ended its long life ! 

I have often asked both mother and daughter 
for a history of some of their many possessions, 
but they both appeared singularly ignorant 
about them all. " They have been in the family 
for years " sufficed ; but I am sure they could 
have told more about them if they would, and 
I cannot think even now why they were so silent. 
The last time I saw the daughter her conversa- 
tion turned much on the past and on her will, 
and as she began the subject I inquired who 
was to have a particularly beautiful two-handled 
Charles II. cup which she always used as a 
sugar-bowl ; and she rephed, " I neither know 
nor care. All my things will go to very distant 
cousins ; let them fight it all out after my 
death." A permission of which I believe the 
remaining relations fully availed themselves in 
due course. 

No one passing by the small, insignificant, 
low-browed cottage would ever have believed 
what a storehouse it was of all things old and 
good, for a more ordinary dwelling was surely 

122 



THE OLDEST INHABITANT 

never seen. It stood just back from the street, 
with a gravel-sweep in front, and a flower-bed 
or two on the grass, all being reached by opening 
a green gate. If the visitor were well liked 
he or she was accompanied to the green gate ; 
if liked a little, only to the front door ; but if 
an unwelcome guest appeared the bell was rung 
and the maid went to the door. I never heard 
of any one who was shown out by the maid ever 
being strong-minded enough to intrude within 
the green gate a second time ; I am sure no one 
would have dared to do so when the mother 
was alive. In later days life behind it was not 
quite as select, and people were allowed in who 
most certainly would never have been tolerated 
in the good old times. 

I wish intensely that I had understood life as 
I understand it now, when I was first married, 
for certainly if I had done so I should have had 
a much better time. But I was, as are all young 
people, an ardent reformer. I could see nothing 
good in old ways, which appeared merely out- 
of-date nuisances to me ; and above all I was 
appalled by the manner in which every single 
thing I did, and, indeed, things which I did not do, 
were discussed, gossiped over, and talked about, 
until I felt as if I lived under a microscope with 
the eye of a fiend directed above on the lens ! 
Among the most eager wielders of the instrument 
of torture were this especial mother and daughter, 
and had it not been that I was niece to one of 

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FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

the most respected members of the town I 
should have had even a worse time at their 
hands than I did. They were, moreover, pro- 
vided with another souffre-douleur who really did 
behave atrociously, though now I understand 
that she did so because she was not given a fair 
chance, for the moment she appeared in the 
town she was at once treated to a liberal diet of 
cold-shoulder. This she repaid by spilling assa- 
foetida down the letter-box of the immaculate 
cottage, and by inciting her brothers to lay dead 
cats about the garden and on the window-sills, 
until violent hysterics ensued and a male cousin 
was sent for who spoke of police and a lawyer, 
and in consequence peace was in a measure 
proclaimed and kept. 

I think the apocryphal '' smart set " would 
have had a really riotous time in our town, only 
fortunately it did not then exist, for no place 
was ever so easily shocked, and it most certainly 
was a regular stronghold of Mrs. Grundy. 
Hysterics were almost caused because this same 
young woman went up to the farm shooting with 
her husband, where she shot an old hen and put 
up a labourer's hat as a mark ; her last and 
worst crime in their eyes being to dress up all 
the dogs in red flannel knickerbockers, the dogs 
running along after the horses she and her hus- 
band rode, and hating their unbecoming garments 
in the manner a well-brought-up animal always 
loathes anything that makes him the mock of 
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THE OLDEST INHABITANT 

many. I too was righteously shocked at the 
time ; now I recognise that this was just what 
the couple wanted. The town did not mean to 
be friendly. All right ; then the town should be 
shocked; and shocked it was, by what was most 
undoubtedly a series of idiotic practical jokes, 
many of which, however, fell distinctly flat. 
I was always called " Royalty " by these par- 
ticular persons, for they imagined I " gave 
myself airs " over them, simply because I would 
not know them. They thought it a " great 
lark " to insert the birth of my eldest son in the 
local journal as that of a " son and heir " ! As 
I took not the smallest notice of it, and the people 
who knew me were not likely to think me guilty 
of being such an idiot, the lark was born without 
wings, and in consequence fell as flat as anything 
possibly could. I do not know if they ever were 
aware that I fathomed their stupid joke. Any- 
how, it was not as serious in its consequences as 
another some one else perpetrated in announcing 
the birth of a son to a young couple only recently 
married. There vengeance did overtake them, 
and they were cut by the entire place for the 
rest of their stay among us. 

The " son and heir " and " assafoetida " jokes 
brought the oldest inhabitant and me closer 
together ; we began by raging, then ended by 
laughing at the vulgarity of the thing, and ever 
after that I came and went as I would, and had 
many a delightful talk and excellent cup of tea. 

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FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

This latter out of a beautiful tea-set I often 
longed for. Its fellow was made at Sevres for 
Marie Antoinette. I wonder where that one is ! 
The one I knew is still in the family, and I only 
wish I could have owned the beautiful and 
delicate thing. It had been brought back from 
Sevres at the time of the Terror, and there is 
no doubt that the history I was given of the 
tea-set was real enough. 

I think the most pleasant afternoons I spent 
were when I went to keep the old mother com- 
pany while the daughter procured a little rest 
and change. She always sat on one particular 
chair, her " good eye " next the window, her work- 
table, which sold at the sale for over five pounds, 
in front of her, and her hands busy with needle- 
work. Her pet occupation was running the flat 
edging torn off flannel on calico, and so making 
petticoats and bodices for the poor children in 
the town, and I well recollect her being quite 
cross with me when I bought the fine Saxony 
flannel that has a narrow pink edge instead of 
the Welsh, which has, or had, a two-inch border 
of " list," and so gave her ample material for 
her favourite work. The wire blind which guarded 
the room from the profane gaze of the vulgar 
while meals went on was removed after dinner, 
and there was no need to ring the bell. I looked 
in at the window and was beckoned in ; then 
the daughter started off, and I remained on guard 
until she returned to her duty once more. 
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THE OLDEST INHABITANT 

There are no daughters now who would hve 
their whole lives as this daughter did, not from 
any strained sense of duty, but simply because 
nothing else had ever entered her head. She had 
not the smallest amount of education, as one 
means education nowadays ; she could play a 
little, work a little, read, write, and do sums 
correctly, but with art or literature she had not 
the smallest acquaintance. But she read the 
newspaper from the first page to the last, and 
had very strong opinions — real old high Tory 
opinions — on Church and State ; and, moreover, 
both she and her mother were perfect storehouses 
of information about all the families in the county. 
I do not think one marriage missed their vigilant 
eyes, or that there was one scandal of the last 
hundred years that they did not know the most 
intimate details of. I used to get the old lady 
to talk the moment I could, and from her I 
gained an excellent idea of what must have been 
the state of the country during the years when 
Bonaparte's name was used to quiet naughty 
children, and when he was a real and ever- 
present terror. She was a young girl in 1815, 
and remembered seeing the coaches drive through 
Salisbury, where she then lived, decorated with 
laurels after Waterloo. She furthermore recol- 
lected staying before that year with her future 
husband's people in the big red house, when the 
coach was kept in the coach-house with two 
hundred guineas sewn into the hning, and the 

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FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

horses ready harnessed, so that no time should 
be lost in setting out to Salisbury Plain. Why 
this spot was selected I cannot think ; anyhow, 
all were to drive there the moment the beacons 
were lighted that showed Napoleon had landed, 
and in consequence a place so near the coast 
could not possibly be safe. She kept a most 
interesting list of the men, horses, and waggons 
that were available for transport, and had letters 
respecting the defence of the town which I more 
than once begged her to give me to copy. But 
she would not, and now I suppose they are 
destroyed ; another hnk with the past ruthlessly 
snapped in the usual most unnecessary manner. 

The letters were kept in a series of silk bags, 
each of which had a separate history. The 
purple silk bag was made to carry with her 
wedding pelisse, which was apparently bottle- 
green. These bags took the place of pockets, 
and are revived to-day in the absurd bags most 
women carry and lose, and the taste of the 
owner was supposed to be shown by the colour 
of the bag, which must not match the costume, 
but must be a " sweet contrast." I was not 
shown a bit of the bottle-green, but the purple 
bag was a magnificent shade, and apparently had 
not faded at all, and this held her love-letters, 
if the short, dry epistles she occasionally showed 
me could be called by that name. Another pink 
bag, made to be carried with a pale blue silk 
dinner dress, contained quaint invitations to 

128 



THE OLDEST INHABITANT 

dinner, in which the guest was bidden to partake 
of a " fine haunch of venison sent by our good 
friend the Squire," and apologising for the late- 
ness of the hour, 4.30, as the venison had to be 
cooked by the landlady of the inn, next door to 
which they lived, and this was the only hour 
that she could manage to undertake the stupen- 
dous joint. 

When I turned over these old invitations she 
used to go back in her memory to the events 
themselves ; old jealousies would be revived, 
old scandals raked up, old dresses described; 
and I wondered how any one ever lived to be 
old when I heard of muslins damped to cling 
round young forms in the early style of the 
Empire, and when I heard low dresses and short 
sleeves were always worn. True, three-cornered 
handkerchiefs were folded over the neck when 
the house was left for one of the rare short walks, 
and sleeves with elastic round the top were 
drawn on in winter. In summer long mittens 
sufficed, and no one ever wore boots ; that would 
have been considered vulgar. Thin shoes tied 
with sandals were the only wear. What wonder 
that consumption was rife and that whole 
families faded away and sank into an early grave ? 
Certainly for winter very large fur capes and 
muffs were worn, as were enormous beaver 
bonnets ; these had a wide ribbon passed over 
the crown and crossed ; this formed the strings, 
which were tied under the chin, and great skill 
I 129 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

was needed to make a " fetching bow." How to 
tie a bow, how to enter and leave a coach, were 
some of the lessons given at a " ladies' academy." 
Even in my mother's days, at least thirty years 
after old Mrs. B.'s, a broken-down carriage was 
kept in the stable-yard of her school at Thorp 
Arch, in Yorkshire, and she and her sisters were 
one and all instructed in the art mentioned above. 
But little else was taught to either lady, save 
delicate needlework, a little French, a little 
twanging of the harp, a few Italian songs sung 
with an excruciating accent, and a great deal of 
deportment. I never saw my old friend in an 
easy chair ; to her last days she sat bolt upright 
on an ordinary dining-room chair covered with 
horse-hair; and I do not recollect her daughter 
either lounging about or lying on a sofa in the 
manner that the youngest amongst us does at the 
present day. " I was one of one and twenty, 
my dear," she always said once during any one's 
visit, and I believe her remark was strictly true. 
She had taken the last of this enormous brood 
from her mother, who died after this final effort 
at populating her parish, and she had been a 
model daughter. I do not know what became 
of the twenty, but I should think they one and 
all died young. I heard of hundreds, literally, 
of cousins, but never of any nearer relation ; and 
she must have married comparatively late in life, 
for the daughter was her only child, and I am 
sure she would, if she could, have emulated her 
130 



THE OLDEST INHABITANT 

mother. Or at least provided a son to carry on 
the name and the business, which had been in 
the family in a straight line for over two hundred 
years. 

I lament now over the decadence of the town, 
but my lamentations are songs of joy when 
compared with those of my old friend. It had 
been bitter enough for her to leave her square 
red-brick house and see it merged into the inn, 
but her sorrow sank into nothing before her rage 
at the manner in which some of the other houses 
were filled. 

My North Street friends were good enough for 
me ; indeed, their children would be much surprised 
in that I do not say they were a great deal too 
good ; but they succeeded a real old County 
family possessed of a ghost. I never could 
make out quite what happened in the house, 
but some child was mysteriously murdered, and 
ever after in one particular room a hand always 
came through the wall and beckoned in a shadowy 
and ghostly manner. The disappearance of the 
family did not exorcise the ghost ; my old friend 
used to be so tortured by its appearance that 
she persuaded her husband to brick up the special 
place. Both she and he were the least super- 
stitious, most hard-headed people I ever met, 
but both declared they saw the hand. The wall 
was bricked up and the hand disappeared, though 
why a second thickness of wall stopped the ghost 
I cannot think ; if it could get through one 

13 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

surely a second brick should not have daunted it 
at all ! I wonder what the oldest inhabitant 
would have said if she could know that that 
house is now a boys' school ? I do not believe 
she would have survived the idea of such dese- 
cration. I was always glad when I could get 
her away from the window in the dining-room, 
either into the little box of a drawing-room or 
out on the lawn, but I could not always succeed. 
When I did we usually had a long stay in the 
square small hall, out of which the staircase led 
in the manner a ladder goes up into a loft. I 
always dreaded that staircase, somehow ; it was 
to be a death-trap for the daughter, for she fell 
on it in a fit or a faint and was killed on the very 
spot. Somehow it looked so dangerous I never 
could pass it without a shudder even in my 
earliest days. It had a short step and dangerous 
curve, and suggested an accident, which, however, 
did not occur until very many years after I had 
left the town for evermore. 

I once went up the stairs to have a long and 
important consultation with the daughter on the 
soul-stirring subject of clothes, as a local wedding 
was imminent and she could not make up her 
mind what to put on. We turned to the right 
at the top of the first flight of stairs and entered 
the spare room. A gaunt four-post bedstead 
nearly filled it up, and the only other article of 
furniture was an equally enormous wardrobe. 
She opened the doors and displayed shelves full, 
132 



THE OLDEST INHABITANT 

literally full, of rolls upon rolls of silks and stuffs, 
one after the other, and all more hideous and old- 
fashioned than I can say. There were also some 
yards of heavy brocades and velvets, and boxes 
held odds and ends of most valuable lace. From 
what I gathered at different times from her and 
from her mother, I think smuggling was to be 
held responsible for most of these treasures. 
Alas ! when we unrolled some of the silks we 
found them split in all the folds ; all the same 
we discovered enough of a brown and white check 
for a dress. This was made up by the local 
modiste; and as she was rather dubious about 
the style and utterly careless as to whether the 
checks met or not, I suffered a good deal from 
that garment on Sundays, for I had to sit behind 
it for more years than I should have believed it 
would have held together. Beside these stores 
of material, every scrap of crape they had ever 
possessed was there waiting for the next death ; 
even the widow's heavy bonnet and veil were 
preserved intact. Why, I do not know ; though 
as in those days the daughter still had hopes of 
a husband, I expect she kept it in store with an 
eye to a possible future of her own. 

In the hall was a most beautiful grandfather's 
clock, beside several cases of strange birds shot 
" down to sea " by her male relations at different 
times, and one or two very large oil pictures and 
portraits. These latter sold for a few pounds ; 
perhaps because they had some great holes 

133 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

knocked in them. All the same I know enough 
about art to say whoever bought them had a 
bargain. One I am certain was by a master-hand, 
and a good restorer would soon have made it all 
right. Another one was a pathetic memorial of a 
small artist named George, who in the early days 
of the 'forties used to travel round and paint 
portraits for his board and lodging and a few 
shillings pocket-money. Indeed, I think he 
ended his days in a species of pawn in the place, 
always painting the most ghastly pictures, yet 
never earning enough to free himself from the 
incubus of his many small debts. A hideous 
little portrait represented him in the hall, but 
my uncle and my father-in-law had patronised 
him more largely ; they both had enormous 
pictures of a shooting-party, in which they 
appeared in tall hats and long coats and gaiters, 
with powder and shot flasks hung about them 
and the dearest of dogs at their feet. Dogs at 
least do not go out of fashion ! — if I except 
pointers, which in these days of battue shooting 
bid fair to become extinct, if they are not so 
already. 

Beside this fearsome work of art there were 
one or two portraits, which return to me as do 
bad nightmares ; the boys in low frocks and 
long white trousers, the girls much the same, 
but their trousers were finished off with scal- 
loped-out frills, and so in a measure denoted 
the sex 
134 



THE OLDEST INHABITANT 

Another artist's efforts that went the round 
of the town were those of some one who cut out 
silhouettes in black paper. There was a series 
in the hall at the cottage, and my father-in-law 
had one, which I only wish I could find, for I 
would reproduce it here. He very stout and 
tall stood in front : the head of the family and 
no mistake ! his meek crinolined and curled 
wife just behind; then my husband in low frock 
and long trousers, holding a whip, his sister in 
curls and crinoline, then more brothers and 
sisters, until it came to the last, who died a baby. 
Poisoned, so says the entry in the family Bible, 
by a drunken dispenser, who gave her a double 
dose of mercury. The dispenser's name is for- 
gotten, and as this occurred over fifty years ago 
he is no doubt long since dead, but there the 
record stands. Poor little maid ! Her fate, 
though pathetic, is better than her sisters', for 
neither had the happiest of lives, though both 
might have been much more happy had they 
only so willed it, it seems to me. 

I do not recollect for whom the silhouettes in 
the cottage were meant ; one had a pigtail tied 
in gold thread, and a curl of hair at the top under 
the glass proved that the pigtail was real. I 
have been told, but I forget. All I know is that 
he was the original owner of an awful memorial 
ring we always looked at with awe. It repre- 
sented a skeleton in hair under glass, and was 
never parted with day or night. I wonder who 

135 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

has that hideous ring now, or if it were buried 
with its owner, as it most undoubtedly ought 
to have been ! 

When we once reached the drawing-room I 
could have stayed there ; and indeed often did 
stay there : for hours. It would have sent a 
modern connoisseur mad with rage and envy 
to have seen the beautiful things in the twelve- 
foot square space. I used to long to possess an 
exquisite Dresden bowl and some old Chelsea 
china ; while will it be beheved that there were 
three Chippendale mirrors in the room ? They 
averaged fifteen pounds at the sale, and there had 
been days, I know, when the ladies had scrimped 
the coal and gone cold to bed because they could 
not afford to waste a penny. In the early years 
of my married life they were almost poverty- 
stricken. I do not think they could have known 
the value of their goods. They could have fur- 
nished the cottage simply for a hundred pounds, 
yet here were things worth a thousand pounds 
and more all about them every day. 

One of the most curious relics in the house was 
a helmet worn by one of the yeomanry in the 
earliest days of the century; and long after the 
father's death a rug was made out of the uniform 
coat, a neat border to it being made out of a red 
coat he wore , I do not know when ; certainly it 
was not a hunting coat. If he hunted at all, 
which I doubt, it would have been in black. 
Solicitors knew their place in those days, and 
136 



THE OLDEST INHABITANT 

would not have presumed to ruffle it in scarlet 
with the members of the hunt. I never saw 
the piano shut, and on weekdays an old-fashioned 
" piece " was on the stand, ready at any moment 
to be performed. On Sundays this was replaced 
by " Hymns Ancient and Modern," but I never 
heard the piano played ; doubtless a hymn was 
now and then picked out, but anything more 
elaborate was never attempted, by the owners 
of the piano at least. 

It gave one a glimpse straight back into the 
very early years of the last century, or even into 
the century before that, to look into the kitchen 
and glass-cupboard. The dresser held one entire 
service of Crown Derby china, the glass-cupboard 
another one of Worcester, and these were in daily 
use ; and I have heard both mother and daughter 
scoff at a friend who, when blue and white willow- 
patterned china began to be considered valuable, 
arranged her collection safely in a cabinet. " Her 
grandmother used those dishes for legs of mutton 
and the dishes for vegetables," they said. " How 
she would have laughed to see them stuck up as 
ornaments about the room I " I often trembled 
to see the way in which the old china and glass 
at the cottage was used every day, but no harm 
appeared to come of it. Good things had always 
been in use in this family, yet it did seem a little 
careless to use wine-glasses that sold for over a 
pound each at the sale, and dishes that were almost 
as costly in everyday use. I am not intending 

137 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

to discuss the vexed question of Tariff Reform, 
for I do not consider I know enough on the 
subject to hold forth upon it, but all the same 
I am more thankful than I can say that the 
Germans do use us as a dumping-ground and 
that things are as inexpensive as they are nowa- 
days, for if they were not every woman who 
owns a house must most undoubtedly keep it 
in order herself. The maids of the present day 
have been brought up to respect nothing. Glass 
is something to smash, a dish something to chip, 
and a carpet to spot. Gas or electric light is 
turned on and burned recklessly. These ladies 
remembered the sparse light given by the colza 
oil lamps ; even the days of candles were known 
to them, and they possessed Sheffield plate 
sudffers with which to snuff the candles, tray 
und all complete. Furthermore, they were pro- 
vided with little china ends with a spike which 
were called save-alls. On these the last scrap 
of a wax candle was impaled, thus ensuring it 
should be burned to the very end. 

The security, the light, the easy pleasures, the 
rapid communication of the present day have 
caused people to forget how very, very different 
was the life of the people of England only about 
a hundred years ago. Even in my time the 
town was never lighted after dark if there ought 
to be a moon, no matter if one of our celebrated 
fogs came up. No matter if the south-west wind 
was howling over the Causeway and the sky 
138 



THE OLDEST INHABITANT 

was absolutely obscured with heavy black clouds ; 
a moon was somewhere in the sky, and therefore 
no gas was allowed. In yet earlier days there 
were no lamps at all ; lanterns were carried as 
a matter of course ; and a watchman went round 
during the night and called the hours. I re- 
collect quite well, too, that even when there was 
no moon the gas went out at ten. Any decent 
person ought to be in bed then ; if they were not, 
so much the worse for them ; they must find 
their way home in the best manner they could. 

The good old times indeed ! They were nothing 
of the kind save for a very favoured few, and 
even they were not as well off as the villagers 
are nowadays. No ! personally I have no hanker- 
ing after the past, and have learned to be thankful 
for light, air, and space, and to forget the days 
of stage-coaches, oil-lamps, and the window-tax 
that closed windows to save the impost, even 
our own house having at least four bricked-up 
windows, though naturally the window-tax was 
repealed long before I can remember. 

No account of the oldest inhabitant would be 
complete without some few words about the 
garden ; nor must I omit the story of one of the 
clocks in the house, for I cannot help thinking 
it must have been the product of some successful 
theft. A man appeared in the town one day 
with four of these clocks ; they were early 
Empire clocks, and very choice specimens of the 
period, and all were exactly alike. A local trades- 

139 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

man bought them, sold one to my father-in-law, 
one to the ladies of the cottage, one to one of 
the " County," and kept the other himself. The 
man was French, and sold the clocks for a mere 
trifle, and then disappeared. The clock sold for 
eight guineas at the sale, and I am assured that 
ours is worth a great deal more, if I want to 
dispose of it, which at present at any rate I do 
not ! It is certainly the best time-keeper I ever 
knew, and it has been in the family for over 
sixty years. 

The garden was quite the most charming place 
in the town, and sitting there one could scarcely 
believe there was any dwelling-place near. On 
one side ran the burial-ground of the chapel, 
but so well screened that one never thought 
about it at all, and in front rose in all their 
splendour of form and colour the long, lovely 
range of the wonderful hills. I do not think any 
special gardening was ever done ; all the same 
I never saw such rows of white iris, or such crowds 
of violets, which from October onwards seemed 
to perfume the air. The strawberries, too, were 
marvellous ; if they failed in other gardens they 
never failed there, and the meagre income was 
often supplemented by their sale and the sale 
of the asparagus. There must be something in 
the soil of the place that is especially good for a 
garden. I know neither money nor skilled help 
added to that garden, yet it was always a picture, 
come when one might into the delightful spot. 
140 



THE OLDEST INHABITANT 

The great pride of the garden in my eyes was the 
magnificent wistaria, which had a trunk quite 
as large as a lady's waist, and which was one 
vast cascade of lilac flowers all April and May ; 
but the ladies themselves loved dearly a quite 
horrible araucaria, or " monkey-puzzle," which 
stood in the centre of the lawn, the age of which 
they computed from the rings on the trunk. 
It began to die soon after the mother died, 
dropping its branches in the most unkind manner, 
until finally it had nothing left save a top-knot ; 
then the tree blew down, and that was the end of 
that ! Quite a glorious arbour was formed from 
the trunk of another tree, which was one mass 
of the climbing rose known as the Seven Sisters, 
and here we would have our tea out of the " Marie 
Antoinette " service, the tea in a Chippendale 
caddy enclosing two silver caddies, one for green, 
one for black tea, and the sugar in the Charles II. 
tankard, which I never saw without breaking 
the Tenth Commandment, and I only wish now 
I had somehow managed to buy it at the sale. 
No one can have as many memories as I have 
connected with it, and I am sure the poor thing 
will never be happy shut away in a cabinet. 
It has heard all the scandal of the county for 
at least a hundred and fifty years, and must be 
quite out of its element in a strange and alien 
land! 

I recollect with a sad smile the many love- 
affairs that the daughter had, and which never 

141 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

came to anything as definite as a proposal. Her 
heart must have been shattered into a hundred 
bits, and many and various were her disappoint- 
ments. A fresh curate roused fresh hopes, a 
widowed rector caused her to lose twenty years 
at one fell swoop and to blossom out once more 
into a most unbecoming girlhood. Her first 
love played her false about ten years before I 
knew her, when she was a blooming, bouncing 
lass of twenty or so ; and I have often wondered 
if he did play her false or said no more than her 
last lover, whose tender tones when he bid her 
take care of herself until he returned were con- 
strued into an offer; and his request that she 
would allow him to enter by the garden door 
was equivalent to a prayer for her to name the 
happy day. I laughed at her then, as I laughed 
at her weird evening dress and the red opera- 
cloak which used to come out when we had our 
theatricals or held some of the subscription 
dances, but I should not smile now. Her love- 
affairs were very real to her, and I fancy they 
lightened considerably what must have been a 
very dull and decorous existence. All the same 
she took the most profound interest in the very 
smallest details of the life : if life it could be 
called: in and round the town. For years she 
had a class in the Sunday-school ; and I cannot 
help wondering what she taught her scholars; 
but then I expect the Church Catechism took up 
all the time. For still more years she managed 
143 



THE OLDEST INHABITANT 

the Clothing Club. I can see her as I write at the 
receipt of custom, in front of her a large bowl of 
water into which, at my suggestion, she cast the 
pennies to cleanse them, and her brow knitted over 
the accounts, while she lectured defaulters and 
praised punctual subscribers in a manner that 
never would be tolerated for five moments in these 
very independent days of ours. Then the Clothing 
Club was a remarkable institution. Two days 
were set apart in December, when the women 
of the town and immediate neighbourhood were 
ordered to repair to the Town Hall and allow us 
to inspect their purchases. Woe to that woman 
who expended her savings on artificial flowers 
or finery of any sort or kind ! I have seen 
elderly women sharply reprimanded and sent 
back to the shops to exchange what they had 
bought for something more suitable. If they 
rebelled they were expelled from the club, as, 
indeed, they were for immorality or drunkenness 
and other similar sins ! Each lady was respon- 
sible for her particular clubbites; and I recollect 
one of my women gave me a considerable amount 
of joy from her bundle, for it contained first a 
new crinoline, then material to " maike me a 
tayle " — that is to say, a skirt — and finished up 
with stuff " to maike me a shroud " a thing 
I do not believe she has yet required, though if 
she is still alive she must be considerably over 
eighty years of age. 

A Mayor of the new school suggested one year 

143 






FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

that this custom should be stopped and that the 
women of the club should be allowed to spend 
their money as they liked. I think he forgot 
that it was the subscribers' money as well, and 
that the two days' inspection, while it was hard 
work for the ladies, brought the women into 
close touch with them and made them friends. 
The young ones were taught to spend their money 
carefully, and the older ones were none the worse 
for a reminder that the whole family was to 
benefit by the club, and not the woman herself. 
In my time it was rare indeed to find a mother of 
a family who required this reminder. The bundles 
all held house-linen or shirts for the men ; any 
finery was for the little girls ; the mother never 
bought a rag for herself, and her purchases were 
made in the most self-forgetful manner possible. 
It was only the widows and elderly spinsters who 
transgressed, and they were very speedily reduced 
to order. The tradesfolk too benefited very 
much from the club, and their shops were given 
over to the women for at least a week before 
these inspections. Favoured customers from 
the country had a glass of wine and a piece of 
cake; the whole place reeked of unbleached 
calico and woollen stuffs ; and the advice of the 
shopkeeper always coincided with that of the 
ladies. Finery was not in evidence in my day. 
I daresay now cheap blouses and smart skirts 
are to the fore, and even the club itself may 
not exist. The class it benefited is far better off 
144 



THE OLDEST INHABITANT 

now than it was then, and I think many who 
used to be subscribers are dead ; while still more 
are in the position of needing help themselves 
rather than being able to give it. Pace the 
Mayor, the club days were very amusing and 
cheerful, and I am sorry indeed that they are 
considered " degrading," at any rate by him. 
For no doubt as his Worship has condemned 
them they have now been entirely given up. 



145 



CHAPTER VI 

CHURCH AND CHAPEL 

There were three subjects which were never 
discussed in my early days, and I cannot but 
think this silence was a wise thing. They were 
the state of one's purse, the state of one's body, 
and the state of one's soul. Now every one talks 
openly about one and all, and sometimes the 
conversation is the reverse of edifying. Doubtless 
it was owing to this fact that I knew nothing 
whatever about the difference in social status 
between those who belonged to the Church of 
England, and those who followed any particular 
form of Dissent. Neither did I know that there 
were any differences in the manner in which one 
could dissent if one were so minded. Personally 
I had never troubled about the matter at all. 
One went to church on Sundays just as one rose 
in the morning and went to bed at night ; and in 
London, naturally, I had nothing whatever to do 
with what one may term " behind the scenes " 
of the religious life. When I married I was 
considerably astonished at what I found was 
146 



CHURCH AND CHAPEL 

awaiting me: as astonished as most of the 
present-day brides would be were they plunged 
back again into the 'seventies of the last century 
and. forced to wear their best clothes and bonnets 
on Sunday, a costume which we one and all 
donned to proceed to the morning service in the 
parish church. 

In the first place, we not only went to church 
twice on a Sunday, but our modest establishment 
was expected to go too, and a pew, or rather 
a section of one, was set apart for the maids. 
Bonnets were de rigueur, as were best garments ; 
and it was the duty of the housewife to see that 
the " maidens " went; to comment on their clothes 
and to hold converse with them after church on the 
subj ect of the sermon ; and to see they had absorbed 
their due amount of so-called religious teaching. 
Family prayers began and ended the day, and the 
Rector of the parish, as a rule, presented a copy 
of his favourite formula as a marriage gift, which, 
with an enormous family Bible, lived on a table 
close to the fireplace in the dining-room, to be 
ready for use at the orthodox hours. We began 
in the good old-fashioned way, but alack ! that 
my sense of humour did not allow me to continue 
the ceremony, for something untoward invariably 
occurred. Either the parrot swore, the dogs 
barked, or the cat jumped on the table and 
began a feast " on her own," while, owing to the 
fact that we lived close to the brewery, the head 
of the family was scarcely ever found at his 

147 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

post in the house. In the morning he was giving 
orders until the breakfast was spoiled ; in the 
evening he was answering the last letters, which 
in our time did not leave the town much before 
ten. Now they go out and the office is closed 
at eight. Such long hours cannot be endured 
by the modern post-office; although in justice 
to it let me state, that the correspondence has 
increased a thousandfold ; and it would no longer 
be possible, as it was in my earliest days ; for each 
letter to be scrutinised and remarked on; and 
later on, when post-cards came in ; for the clerk 
in charge to read every single one. As I once 
found him doing ; the cards all laid out on the 
small and primitive counter. 

Now the post-office is a post-office ; then it was 
the much smaller portion of a shop, where one 
could buy delightful games and toys, and to 
linger in which was a joy to every child in the 
place. Though the severe post-mistress, with 
her gigantic cap tied under her chin, was rather 
a terror, and caused the joy to be a somewhat 
fearful one to any small person who possessed 
nerves, and was afraid of her. She was, however, 
in her way, an extraordinary personality ; she 
managed everything herself, and while her hus- 
band was not much use, and finally ended his days 
by falling into the river on a dark night when 
he was coming out of a public-house on the quay ; 
no one ever heard a word against her, and she 
managed the shop and post-office until she died. 
148 



CHURCH AND CHAPEL 

Then her son took up the duties, and he in his 
turn carried them on until the work outgrew him. 
He had the most beautiful collection of Crown 
Derby china, and I have often wondered what 
became of that and the many local curiosities 
he must have collected during his long life ! 

But to return to the church. I believe that 
when the church was restored in the early part 
of the last century it was a very hideous structure, 
but at any rate it was extremely old, and the 
work of restoration was begun by blowing up the 
walls with gunpowder, because they were too 
strong to be otherwise dealt with. The chancel 
and the small side chapel were let alone, but the 
rest of the fabric was razed to the ground, and 
rebuilt about 1842. When I knew the church 
first the school children all sat in the chancel, 
the Rector and his curate and the clerk inhabited 
a three-decker, and the galleries and the body 
of the church were filled with pews with straight 
backs. We entered these by doors which were 
fastened with bolts. And woe betide that stranger 
who had sufficient temerity to enter a pew unin- 
vited ! He was soon beckoned out by the clerk and 
put in the side aisle, and so at once learned his real 
position in the place. The sight of a stranger then 
caused an absolute flutter ; the inhabitants cast 
looks first at each other and then at the object 
of their wonderment, who usually turned out to 
be some one known to one of the tradesmen, and so 
all our excitement was speedily calmed down. 

149 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

Once there was nearly a scandal about a 
similar appearance. One of my pretty aunts 
was always up to fun and frolic, and even in 
those prehistoric days she was open to what may 
be called " a lark." She had seen an advertise- 
ment for a wife in one of the local papers, and had 
replied to it, begging the man, if he really meant 
business, to appear in the church on the next 
Sunday, when he would see the writer sitting 
clad in a pink dress and with roses in her bonnet 
in the first pew hung with green curtains in the 
centre aisle. As there was not such a pew in 
the church she felt quite safe. She noticed the 
stranger, of course, the moment he appeared, 
and was highly entertained at the success of her 
joke. But her amusement was not so great when 
the man walked down the avenue and demanded 
to see her, or, failing her, her brother-in-law ! 
It turned out that he had taken her letter to 
the post-office, the post-mistress told him whose 
handwriting it was, and he was most furiously 
indignant at being told to march. He really 
did want a wife, poor man ! but he had to return 
to Weymouth, where he was, I believe, in some 
shop, minus a wife, but plus his railway fare and 
a good dinner, though he did not cease to have 
hopes for some time. He wrote several letters 
and spent several Sunday mornings in the church, 
until my uncle became very angry, packed my 
aunt off to her old relations in Bath, and gave the 
man a piece of his mind, which resulted in his 
150 



CHURCH AND CHAPEL 

retiring from the chase, and I only trust he 
speedily found a suitable helpmate in his own 
rank of life. 

Rank and degree were marked by the position 
of one's pew in church, the left-hand side pews 
being considered the more aristocratic, albeit 
the pew sacred to the Rectory was on the right 
hand. At the top on the left hand was the 
Corporation Pew, with a socket into which the 
" Queen Anne " silver mace was placed when 
the Mayor and his followers had taken their seats 
therein. It was the only square pew in the place, 
and when not required by the authorities was 
put at the service of a schoolmaster who, with 
fine impartiality, took his boys alternately to 
church and chapel. Behind this was the " Church- 
ing Pew," set aside for women who desired to 
return thanks after the birth of their infants. 
This pleasing service used to take place in the 
middle of either morning or evening prayer, as 
it suited our Rector, but that soon had to be 
altered. One of my small cousins was having a 
birthday party, and remarked in a most senten- 
tious manner that his brothers ought to be very 
much obliged to him, as if he had not taken the 
trouble to be born they never would have had 
such a lovely cake. To which his older brother 
replied : " Nonsense ; we are only obliged to 

Mama, who " and then proceeded to quote 

from the service at length. This charming 
anecdote was retailed to the Rector, and for ever 

151 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

after that special service was taken when there 
were no Httle pitchers with long ears about ! 
Finally the Churching Pew was forgotten and 
inhabited by the family, the mother of whom used 
to give me such delight in the way she behaved 
during the last few months of her stay amongst us. 

I recollect quite well how I scoffed at the dirty 
chancel, the uncomfortable pews, and the some- 
what slovenly services, and I pined to reorganise 
the whole place. London churches had not blos- 
somed out as they have done of late years, and 
in my day one knew without asking whether one 
had stumbled on a Protestant or Roman Catholic 
place of worship. All the same they were clean 
and orderly ; we had flowers on the altar and 
decent altar-cloths ; but there was nothing of the 
kind in our country church. The altar had a 
stuffy red cloth on it, and stood against a wall 
reeking with damp ; above it was an enormous 
window full of plain glass, the glare from which 
was dreadful ; the cushions at the altar-rails 
were in rags, and the children made the chancel 
into a rubbish-place with their old books and 
mats and other debris. All the same the vener- 
able Rector did his duty nobly, and was a gentle- 
man in the truest sense of the word, and I would 
rather see his like than the present-day specimens, 
of whom I think the less said the better in more 
cases than one. 

His sermons were always scholarly and excel- 
lent, though his ways were quaint; for I recollect 
152 



CHURCH AND CHAPEL 

on more than one occasion he gathered his sparse 
evening congregation into the chancel because 
it was warmer than the body of the church : 
a fact he announced from the reading desk. 
Furthermore, another time he came into the 
church in his usual stumbling, uncertain manner, 
looking from right to left as he went up the aisle 
to his place, and as he perceived I was the only 
" worshipper " he stopped and said, " I think 
we may as well go home." I agreed, and he and I 
plunged out into the stormy night and walked back 
to our respective houses, both equally glad that 
we had not to remain in the damp, deserted place. 
When I was first in the town a weird collection 
of rubbish used to go the round of the place, 
called the " Jews' basket," and the unfortunate 
lady who had the wretched thing, was expected 
not only to worry her friends to buy the articles 
contained in it, but to contribute two articles 
of her own handiwork, to be disposed of in their 
turn by some one equally unfortunate. As we 
one and all knew the things in the " Jews' 
basket " by heart, our only excitement was to 
see what the last victim had contributed and 
what she had disposed of. My first attempts 
were hilarious if nothing else. In those days 
matches were extremely dear, for the small 
Swedish matches one buys now had never been 
heard of, and whenever we could we used spills 
made out of old letters, and great skill was 
displayed in the making thereof. Some were 

153 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

merely folded flat ; others were twisted round 
and finished by an elegant curl at the top ; while, 
again, others were made out of gilt and coloured 
paper and pinched in here and there in a cunning 
pattern. To hold these spills I made tubes out 
of cardboard and stuck them with glue on a 
round cardboard bottom ; these I transformed 
into elegant ladies with frills upon frills of tissue- 
paper petticoats, finishing them off with heads 
and bodies cut out of our only fashion paper, the 
Queen. But they did not find favour among the 
friends of the Jews, and returned to me so often 
and so soiled that I finally burned them, made 
a calculation of what the whole contents of the 
basket would come to : about fifteen shillings : 
and with one vast effort I paid over this sum, 
burned all the dirty old relics, and returned the 
basket empty, begging I might never set eyes 
on the wretched thing again. I never did, and 
I believe that very soon the Jews were left to 
themselves, as far, at least, as any basket was 
concerned. 

Indeed, the Jews used to trouble the Rectory 
people a good deal, and I was invited to a species 
of grown-up Bible class at which the manners 
and customs of the Jews were to be discussed, with 
an eye to some gigantic effort for their ultimate 
conversion. Now Mrs. Rector was a real scholar ; 
she knew all the dead languages ; but she did not 
know the very least thing about the Jew of that 
date ; and as it happened I did know a very great 
154. 



CHURCH AND CHAPEL 

deal. Not only had my eldest sister married 
into a Jewish family, but one of my greatest 
friends was a Jewess with very strict parents, 
and with her I went many and many a time to 
the synagogue, and had also been present at a 
great many of their religious observances; and 
here I may honestly state that I believe there are 
few better people in the world than a real ortho- 
dox Jew and Jewess. So when the dear old lady 
began to describe the Jews as they never were 
or never could be ; and to almost weep, so anxious 
was she to make bad Protestants of them, that 
I told her a little more about the Jews than she 
knew. I was never asked to try and convert 
the Jews again, though I was constantly asked 
for other help, and we were always the very 
greatest of friends to the end. 

Looking back, I do think I must have been a 
regular " dispensation " to the place, and it 
would have been far better for me if I had gone 
somewhere where I could have associated with 
my equals, and above all with my superiors in 
mental attainments. But I never had a chance 
of doing anything of the kind in a way that could 
have done me any good ; and I think the church 
might even have been the better without my 
interference, albeit the Rector allowed me to do 
very much as I liked. I was too young to know 
the perfect passion old people have for any 
association ; to me a hideous thing was a hideous 
thing ; now I understand that any alteration 

155 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

means anguish for some one, and I should never 
place a reforming finger on any single thing if I 
had my way. All the same I am quite sure our 
first Christmas decorations were a revelation, 
and I laugh to myself as I think how we laboured 
and how wonderful the church appeared under 
our unpractised hands. I set all the school- 
children to weave wreaths for the pillars in the 
church schoolroom, while I, my husband, and 
the curate grovelled on the dining-room floor 
sticking black and red letters on cardboard edged 
with green leaves, thus forming texts which 
went all round the hideous galleries of the great 
church. One or two of the elder ladies helped, 
advised, and criticised, but the real work was 
done by us three and the school-children ; and 
late on Christmas Eve the Rector came and saw, 
and allowed that the place had never looked so 
well. I thought the old clerk was not as pleased 
as we were, for formerly he had done the decora- 
tions single-handed, but he stayed behind to 
clear up, and we had no idea of what he meant 
to do. The next day we discovered he had 
added his decorations to ours ; the inside walls 
were all covered with trailing ivy, and in each 
pew was stuck a much-berried branch of holly. 
I own I gasped at first, but I had presence of mind 
to tell him I much admired his part of the work. 
Next year I gave him five shillings after we had 
finished, and he never again assisted, except by 
clearing up the verv trifling mess we left behind. 
156 



CHURCH AND CHAPEL 

He even admired our Easter decorations when, 
after some years, we had travelled as near Rome 
as to place these about the dear old church ; and 
furthermore he contributed to the harvest decora- 
tions. But the less said about these the better ; 
by the time they were allowed every one helped ; 
potatoes, onions, cabbages, and turnips made 
the church ridiculous ; while my dear friend the 
butcher grew an enormous pumpkin on purpose 
to please me. The pumpkin had a place of honour. 
But I gradually gave up my post of director ; 
a new regime had begun, and I imitated the Snark 
that was a Boojum, and silently and sadly 
vanished away from that particular place of 
worship. 

Before that happened I had the care of the 
altar, and in my time the top was a real old pre- 
Reformation stone slab, with the five crosses on it 
that represent the five wounds of the Lord. This 
stone used to " sweat " in damp weather, and 
to preserve the cloth I always kept a piece of 
American leather on the stone. I mention these 
details as I have been repeatedly told that there 
never was a stone altar, but only the usual wooden 
table. But I know there was, and I believe I 
could lead an " earnest inquirer " very near the 
place where it remains in a dishonoured retire- 
ment. But now my old stone altar is replaced 
by an abomination that seems as if it had been 
cut out of pitch-pine by a fretwork saw ; an 
unworthy substitute for the stone slab, but 

157 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

perhaps more suitable for the atmosphere in 
which it remains. 

I had yet another find that was even better. 
One day I was turning out an old oak chest in 
the then vestry, and I came upon a venerable 
black and battered dish. A man who was a 
connoisseur in the matter happened to come in ; 
he took up the dish and examined it carefully. 
It was a very old pewter dish, representing the 
spies returning from Eshcol and carrying the 
grapes ; on each side of the centre were initials, 
and above was inscribed a date, 15 — . I cannot 
at this lapse of time recollect the rest of the date. 
He offered to have the dish restored and regilt, 
and, having the Rector's permission, he took it 
up to town for the purpose. He then found 
that his brother : also an ardent collector of old 
silver and church plate : had in his possession 
the ancient Communion service of St. Mary's 
Church. Finally that was restored to the church, 
and I think is very probably still there, but the 
dish I found is not. There is a " colourable 
imitation " in brass ; it has the same design, 
but no letters and no date, and the gilt pewter 
valuable alms-dish has once more sadly and 
secretly vanished away. 

We had at the time a perfect rush of Irish 
curates in and about the town, and they were 
one and all deUghtful : always ready to help, 
always amusing. Above all we were one and all 
young, and as the Rector was old and his daughters 
158 



CHURCH AND CHAPEL 

were married and away, we did pretty much as 
we liked. Driven to despair over the singing, we 
did one outrageous thing ; and even now I cannot 
understand how it was managed without a most 
tremendous stir. After long and ardent con- 
sultation we brought down the organ bodily 
from its home in the west gallery, and set it in 
the chancel, where the choir then replaced the 
school-children, who were relegated to the gallery. 
There were one or two very angry people who, 
walked out of the church with their noses high 
in the air when they saw what had occurred; 
but there was so little noise, so little opposition, 
that I imagine we must have had a great many 
helpers or we should never have dared to do such 
a deed. One or two people did threaten to have 
the organ replaced, but I informed them that, 
once in the chancel, the organ became the Rector's 
property, and that a faculty would be required 
to get it back. I have not the least idea if this 
be true ; anyhow, it sounded as if it might be, 
and we never heard any more threats on the 
subject. Fortunately the one very rich man in 
the neighbourhood was most genuinely musical, 
and to him we were indebted for much help about 
the organ. He was singularly illiterate ; I don't 
think he ever read a book ; and he never thought 
of picking up one single H ; but the instant his 
fingers touched either organ or piano the "Bander- 
snatch," as he was always called from his long 
and weird appearance, became transformed. A 

159 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

beatific smile appeared on his countenance ; 
his very spidery fingers brought out the soul 
of the instrument, and he became, as he most 
undoubtedly was, a real and most inspired 
musician. The good Bandersnatch told every 
one that the proper place for the organ was the 
chancel. I think, too, he must have found the 
funds, for I am sure no one else could have done 
so. Anyhow, we soon had our choir sifted out ; 
the females were placed at the back of the choir, 
the males were put into surplices purchased by 
our one rich curate, who, moreover, paid for the 
washing of the same as long as he remained in 
the place. The then organist was completely 
self-taught, and we suffered a good bit from his 
vagaries, but from them was evolved by degrees, 
the most excellent music I have ever heard in so 
small a town; and the old organ is replaced 
by a splendid instrument, given, if I mistake 
not, most appropriately, to the memory of the 
Bandersnatch himself. 

Before the Act of 1870 came into operation 
the Church of England school - children were 
taught in a disused church, which, with a yet 
older one, was a survivor of the sixteen that 
were supposed to have once dominated the town. 
We all took turns to manage and inspect the 
school, and I believe we each had a fortnight 
during the year, when we were supposed 
to be present some time each day and to 
see for ourselves what was going on. I should 
i6o 



CHURCH AND CHAPEL 

like very much to take a member of the present 
County Council into that school and show him 
just how things were managed. In the body of 
the church were the older girls and boys, arranged 
in different classes, while the vestry was sacred 
to the infants, who as soon as they could walk 
were sent off to school. They were placed on 
benches, in rows one above the other. Very often 
the smaller infants went to sleep and fell off, but 
the young teachers appeared most kind and 
sweet. Only children themselves, they played 
with and amused the babies, and so became 
apprenticed early to what was undoubtedly their 
role in life, that of being in due time most excellent 
wives and mothers. I do not think a girl ever 
remained at school after she was thirteen, and 
she often enough left it at twelve. She would 
then be placed by one of the ladies as an under- 
servant in some good house. We did not require 
societies, prizes, or bribes of any sort or kind ; 
our favour and countenance were quite enough ; 
and as we were loyally backed up by the parents 
we turned out a race of girls which would be 
hard to beat in these over-educated days of ours. 
Gratefully do I recollect the good servants I had 
out of these same schools ; and I am very sorry 
for the generation that will never have such 
charming memories as I possess of the maidens 
who helped to make my life easy for me, and 
who one and all are my good friends to the 
present day. 

I i6i 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

There was another side to the picture, of 
course, but that mainly touched the boys, and 
I am sure the ladies had nothing to do with them. 
The master in my time was not a very desirable 
man, and I do not think his influence was good, 
but he was not the cause of the particular hard- 
ships that afflicted the boys. Work was scarce 
and badly paid, but not as scarce as it is now, 
for then there were two breweries in full working 
order, beside tan-pits and other small industries, 
particularly harness-making and saddlery, both 
of which manufactures were of the very best. 
Also, the farms absorbed any amount of boys. 
Still, with large families and poor pay, every 
child who could work had to; and I recollect 
one dear little lad called Willie Northover, who 
used to go off to work at early dawn, trotting 
after his father down the lane to the farm two 
miles away. There, with frozen fingers and toes 
covered with chilblains, he either led the plough- 
horses, picked up stones, or scared the birds, 
returning home to creep to bed and sleep until it 
was time to start once more on his toilsome round. 
I persuaded his mother later on to let him stay 
with his grandfather on the farm, so as to be 
saved the long walk. Alas ! that I did so. The 
grandfather was taken ill one foggy, wild winter 
night; Willie went for help, and found a long 
rest in one of the many heath-set ponds near 
the cottage. And yet why alas ? His work was 
over. At the best the life of a farm-labourer is 

l62 



CHURCH AND CHAPEL 

a thing that it is scarcely worth while growing 
up to have to endure ! Still, hard as it sounds, 
these little lads early turned out into the fields 
made most excellent men, and were true lovers 
of the countryside. They knew the haunts and 
names of every bird and beast ; and a great many 
sufferings were forgotten when the first nest was 
found, the cuckoo was first heard, and they could 
race back to the master to tell him about the 
partridges' and pheasants' nests, which were 
discovered sooner by them than by the keenest 
keeper in the world ! I always much dislike 
speaking against the times one lives in; but I 
am sure, terrible as it undoubtedly was, the life 
in the middle of the last century made men out 
of the country lads, who loved their country and 
were far and away better specimens than the 
present-day youth ; on whom it is not necessary 
to dilate, for he can be seen by any one who takes 
the trouble to look out for him ! 

The chapel came in, as regards myself more 
especially, in connection with what was then 
termed the British School. It was taught at that 
time by a most disreputable individual, whose 
" goings-on " had at last to be spoken about. 
Fortunately for me, the Master was one of the 
trustees, and to his wife I took the details. 
Some of our men were Dissenters, and their girls 
went to the British School, and the mothers 
came to me full of complaints and most unsavoury 
details. I went to North Street and stated my 

163 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

facts. At first my friend was furious ; it was a 
case of Church versus Dissent; she would have 
none of it. But, after a long consultation with 
the Master, he managed so diplomatically that 
there was no scandal ; the man disappeared in 
the night ; and a most remarkable man took up 
the reins of the school, and still, I believe, remains 
at the head of affairs. Here I may boldly state 
that I would sooner entrust a lad's education 
to that man than to any other schoolmaster I 
know. His scheme of teaching is wonderful, 
his discipline remarkable, especially in these 
undisciplined days, and if he cared he could 
inscribe the walls of the old disused chapel that 
is still the schoolroom with names that would 
indeed make a roll of honour of which any man 
may be proud. 

I am a strong upholder of the belief that what 
was given to the Church for the use of the Church 
should remain Church property ; but there are 
isolated cases where the State should step in, 
and the case in point is an example of what I 
mean. Things were pretty equal when our school 
was held in the old church, and the Dissenters' 
school in the disused chapel, but now it is quite 
a different matter. After a while great new 
schools were built for the Church, and paid for 
entirely by Church people, who, moreover, sub- 
scribe to the schools and pay a rate for the Council 
school at one and the same time. But there is 
no Dissenter rich enough to replace the old 
164 



CHURCH AND CHAPEL 

chapel with modern buildings. The old chapel- 
rooms have been crowded and overcrowded, 
while the class-rooms in the Church schools are 
almost empty. The parents know where the 
teaching and discipline are the best, but the 
staunch Dissenters will not be cajoled into the 
Church buildings, the Churchman owner will not 
give up the schools to the Council, so the town 
will have to be heavily rated to pay for new 
Council schools, though who is going to pay the 
rate no one seems able to say. 

It is curious to read the history of the first 
Dissenters in the old town, which, notwithstanding 
the fact that there were once sixteen churches, 
was a regular stronghold of Nonconformity in 
those very early days when so many Churchmen 
left the old faith and started a religion of their 
own. At first they gathered in one building, 
where down almost to the end of the eighteenth 
century they were content to go on in the same 
jog-trot way. Then members of the congregation 
began to doubt ; from doubt they came to blows, 
and a second chapel was opened, which, indeed, 
is the only one now used as a place of worship, 
the " old meeting," as it is still called, being the 
school. Soon after that yet another schism 
brought to birth a Unitarian chapel; but that 
is rarely used now. All the influential Unitarians 
are dead or gone away or become members of the 
Church, while the easy-going present-day folk 
no longer trouble themselves at all about points 

i65 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

of doctrine or differences of creed ; they belong 
to the particular ism into which they were born, 
and take things far more easily than their fore- 
bears ever did ; of that there is no doubt what- 
ever. The study of the history of the Non- 
conformists is a very interesting one, and I only 
wish I had known personally some of those 
sturdy, earnest men who in the early days ruled 
as with a rod of iron their respective followers 
and congregations. 

Later on the Dissenters formed a smug and 
satisfied congregation, and there are yet those 
living who can tell us of the string band that sat 
up in a species of west gallery and led the singing in 
the most satisfactory style. There was one extra- 
ordinary minister, too, who was so poor he could 
not afford a fire in his study, so, obtaining a large 
barrel from a friendly brewer, he stuffed it with 
straw, into which he got and covered himself 
well up. Then he began on his sermon, and both 
he and it were soon more than sufficiently warm. 
He was evidently a very cold subject, for he in- 
variably walked about the garden in the summer 
while composing his discourses well wrapped up, 
and with his head enveloped in a red handkerchief 
to keep off any possible draught. As far as I 
can discover, the men one and all yearned after 
knowledge which nowadays would be served out 
to them in the small primers that examinations 
have made us all familiar with. But then they 
had lectures during the week in the chapel on all 
z66 



CHURCH AND CHAPEL 

kinds of abstruse subjects, and enormous teas 
where all the ladies of the congregation furnished 
trays; and great heart-burnings were caused if 
some one gave better cake and attracted in 
consequence many more people to her tray than 
the others did. 

The two *' independent " meeting-houses con- 
tinued their separate ways until about 1849, 
when Dissent began to languish and funds fail. 
It was impossible to maintain two ministers, 
and the " old meeting " was closed and the 
congregation gathered together once more under 
one roof, and the ancient barn was closed until 
1858, when the British School was transferred 
there ; and there it remains as a *' Council school," 
as I remarked before, unto the present day. As 
far as I can make out, small changes were made 
in the structure, though the tombstones in the 
graveyard were removed and set in the walls, 
and present-day children play above the remains 
of their great-grandparents, and neither they nor 
the children are one penny the worse. 

Some of the more intimate details of chapel life 
are most entertaining, and the deacons appear 
to have been a militant set. Two of them were 
particularly quarrelsome, and not only kept the 
congregation in order, but endeavoured to dis- 
cipline each other as well. One great quarrel 
took place over the chandelier which hung in the 
centre of the roof, and, being garnished with tallow 
candles, required to be lowered now and again 

167 



FRESH LEA^^ES AND GREEN PASTURES 

so that the candles might be attended to. The 
chandeUer was kept in place by a heavy weight, 
which had to be released to lower the candles. 
One Sunday the candles had been snuffed by one 
deacon rather more often than the other deacon 
thought necessary, so he held on to the rope 
and would not allow the chandelier to descend. 
When he thought Deacon No. 1 was tired he 
left the rope, when down the chandelier came 
with a rush, scattering the candles, and the 
affrighted congregation fled in dismay. 

On another occasion the deacon rebuked some 
rich member for having placed a penny in the 
soup-plate at the door, which was the ordinary 
manner of making a collection. The next Sunday 
the rich man came with a double handful of 
coppers ; he smashed them into the plate with 
such energy that the plate was shattered, and the 
collection took some time to collect. Indeed, 
I think that sundry small boys had coppers to 
spend the next day that they could not have 
satisfactorily accounted for if they had been 
questioned about them I 

The ordinary Low- Church Simday was dull 
enough for us, but it was a frivolous and gay day 
compared with the one enforced on the unhappy 
child of a Dissenter. We went to church, wore 
our best frocks, and read good books, and walked 
out; and if one of my aunts flatly refused to use her 
drawing-room on Saturday because it would have 
to be dusted on Sunday if she did, and another 
i68 



CHURCH AND CHAPEL 

only allowed us one plate at supper for meat, 
pudding, and cheese alike, there was method in 
their madness. The servants were to be spared 
every possible bit of work. But a Sunday in a 
Dissenter's family must have been one long day 
of agony. The moment breakfast was over 
there was school at the chapel, then a long service 
and an appalhng sermon, then cold dinner, then 
more Sunday-school. Then came tea, to which 
the minister often arrived, when he would cross- 
question the children and the parents to see how 
much they retained of his instruction. More 
chapel followed, and after that came a hideous 
meal of cold beef and cheese and beer, the day 
concluding with bed ; where the more imaginative 
children suffered tortures caused by dwelling on 
the pictures of hell and the devil that the minister 
had given them, while they wondered if the day of 
judgment were as imminent as their instructors 
made out. 

The revivals of that day were on a par, I think, 
with the hysteria of the Salvation Army. I even 
have heard yells and cries emanating from a 
chapel in Yorkshire as I passed by, when the 
minister declared he saw the devil coming through 
the roof, and the whole congregation fled out 
screaming aloud. I have also often heard my 
father-in-law, a staunch Dissenter, declare he 
dreaded revivals more than he could say ; they 
might save souls, but they certainly had a very 
bad effect on the morals of the place. I think 

169 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

nowadays the chapels give a little religion and a 
very great deal of amusement, for certainly even 
among Dissenters Sunday is a very different 
affair from what I have described. A walk would 
have been considered a mortal sin ; now bicycles 
and other means of progression are used, and 
apparently no one is any the worse, and all are 
better for getting about. Then musical services 
bring the young folks together, concerts are got 
up, excursions made, and under the cegis of the 
minister much " pious entertainment " is sought 
and found. 

I had always nourished the idea that a Dissent- 
ing minister was absolutely uneducated. After- 
wards I knew three ; all men far above the ordinary 
curate in knowledge and love of literature. They 
were not what one would call polished gentlemen, 
but I was always very sorry for them ; they were 
absolutely in the power of their deacons and their 
congregations. Educated or not, the Church people 
would not know them socially, and they had no 
one to associate with outside their congregations, 
which did not contain one single lady or gentle- 
man, if one uses, as one must, the ordinary sense 
of the word. 

All the same some of my best friends were 
Dissenters ; we fought shoulder to shoulder at 
elections, of which more presently, we held the 
same opinion on the right every man and woman 
has to make the most of his or her life, and we 
always were on good terms as long as I lived in 
170 



CHURCH AND CHAPEL 

or near the town. Then came one or two pro- 
posed Bills in Parliament I could not away with ; 
the political and most undoubtedly large influence 
of the Nonconformists was and is unscrupulously 
used to get what they want, without the smallest 
consideration of other people's rights and other 
people's feelings. So I had to stand aloof, sad 
at heart to lose my good old friends, but obliged 
to do so because they arrogated to themselves 
rights and powers that could not possibly be 
theirs by any manner of means. 

It is curious to recollect, too, how, before the 
days of universal newspapers and railway trains, 
religion used to be the one prevailing topic of 
conversation among the poorer classes. I have 
been told that wherever they gathered their talk 
was on the interpretation of different parts of the 
Bible, and that at cobbler's bench, blacksmith's 
forge, even at the public-house bar, the burning 
subject was always some particular form of ism, 
or more especially some interpretation of a 
passage in Scripture. And the men, who nowa- 
days would be talking over the latest race or 
football match, and eagerly scanning the columns 
of the Sportsman and the Star for the latest odds, 
thought of little else save what their particular 
pastor had said or what conclusion he had wished 
them to draw from any particular theory he had 
placed before them to contemplate. Free will 
and election, baptism or no baptism, all were 
discussed ; and my father-in-law heard one black- 

171 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

smith shout at the top of his voice : " You may 
as well try to blow the sun out of heaven with 
these 'ere bellows as to take the doctrine of 
predestination out of the Bible." 

Autres temps, autres mceurs ; anyhow, people 
take their religion less miserably nowadays than 
they did then, and little children are not sent to 
bed to cry in the night over their fearful sins 
and the devil and hell. Whether the change is 
for the better or the worse time will show. 
Personally I do not like hell-fire doctrine, but it 
had a most excellent effect on many who were 
brought up under its fear. They were not happy 
infants, but they made most splendid men and 
women ; and I have no doubt that in due time 
that special doctrine will turn up again, and do 
a certain amount of most satisfactory work. 



172 



CHAPTER VII 7 

FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

The first election I recollect was the one I saw 
from the window of the red house belonging to 
the oldest inhabitant, and intensely amused and 
interested I was by the sight, more especially as, 
though I had heard a good deal about it before- 
hand, I was not personally anxious for either 
candidate to win. In all after elections I took a 
vigorous part ; at any rate behind the scenes ; and 
my enjoyment of the day was always considerably 
marred by anxiety lest after all our strenuous 
labour, the man for whom we worked should be 
found, as he all too often was, at the bottom of 
the poll. It would, I think, afford considerable 
copy for the papers of the present day were 
elections carried on in the manner in which they 
were then. My uncle, whose real and secret 
principles were decidedly Tory of the good old- 
fashioned kind, was occasionally agent for the 
Liberal candidate; and as I often accompanied 
him on his canvassing expeditions I sat and 
marvelled at the dexterous manner in which he 

173 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

worked for his employer without committing 
himself to any particular form of political faith. 
In those days bribery was far more open and 
above-board than it is now, and also took place 
only while an immediate election was impending. 
Now that bribery during election-time is well 
nigh impossible, it is all done long before there 
is any idea that an election is imminent. And 
that candidate is wise, if he really means to 
succeed, who begins by taking as large a place 
as he can find in the neighbourhood ; and at once 
turns on a stream of gold that gently percolates 
through every strata of society, until each member 
thereof is in some way or other benefited by it. 
All this bribery must be done long before there 
is apparently the smallest idea that the generous 
creature means to stand for the especial part of 
the county where he has pitched his tent. If he 
manages his tactics well, he is sure to get in. An 
astute agent ploughs the ground, the candidate 
sows the golden seed ; and in the country at any 
rate he reaps his harvest. There are only two things 
that may prevent this same harvest : one is a by- 
election caused by some unexpected event before 
the seed has had time to ripen ; another, such a 
volte- face as was the extraordinary wave that swept 
the country in the election of 1906. Then England 
would have turned out a demi-god had he been 
on the unpopular side, and in consequence in our 
special corner the harvest was reaped by the man 
who had neither ploughed nor sown the seed. 
174 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

The early elections were conducted without 
diplomacy, and were far more rough-and-ready 
affairs, and, indeed, were very much more enter- 
taining in every way. The canvassing also was 
most hilarious. I went with my uncle on several 
of his rounds among the electors, and we rarely 
returned home without some additions to our 
" portable property." Once I listened to his 
diplomatic recommendation of his candidate as a 
man worthy of support in every way, though he 
invariably passed loyally over the matter of his 
political creed. The old lady to whom he was 
holding forth looked at him fixedly and listened 
for some time without speaking. " I don't know 
nothing about either of 'em. This is my husband's 
own place, and all I do know is that the man 
who has that canary bird has the vote." The 
canary bird went home with us, along with an 
ancient gun and sundry other articles, worth at 
the most a few shillings each, but one and all 
valued at a five-pound note by the owners. 
These particular voters were dwellers in the 
heath-land round the town, of which they held 
a certain amount on " lives," most of which have 
now, I am sorry to say, fallen in. These " heath- 
croppers," as they were called, were a sturdy, 
independent race. No landlord could interfere 
with them; there were no by-laws, no building 
laws, no health inspectors to see what they were 
up to, and in consequence their houses were built 
in the most unconventional manner possible. 

175 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

The walls were generally of mud, and the cottages 
were always thatched, while their fuel was peat, 
stacks of which stood against the dwellings, and 
the scent and blue smoke from the fires climbed 
up into the fresh moor air and could be seen 
and smelt for many a mile round. There were 
no roads to these places ; a rough cart-track led 
to them; and I have often wondered how the 
doctor reached them on the dark, wild, tempes- 
tuous nights when he was so often sent for ; either 
to usher in a new life or to help an old one to 
release itself from the bent and tired body that 
held the soul captive against its will. A few 
hens, occasionally some ducks and geese, were 
about the doorstep, but I think the owners lived 
very much on what they poached, on the produce 
of their beehives, and the small amount of corn 
and vegetables they coaxed out of the somewhat 
arid soil. 

Before the days of the ballot canvassing was a 
much easier matter than it is now. At the time 
of the first election I recollect the interests of 
both parties were so equally divided that the votes 
of the " heath-croppers " and a few independent 
men in the town were enough to turn the election. 
The " heath- croppers " were generally favourable 
to the man who came first and invested in what- 
ever they may have made up their minds to sell. 
The others could neither be moved nor bribed ; 
though they could be and were made most un- 
comfortable for some few months after the 
176 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

election by the man for whom they did not vote, 
and for whom they never had the smallest idea 
of voting, were they canvassed and cultivated 
never so wisely. The Liberal side was naturally 
the unpopular side, though one of the Squires, 
being of the old Whig persuasion, called himself 
Liberal, and endeavoured to act up to the name. 
He, of course, could not be ostracised by his peers, 
but his followers were ; and I always admired the 
men who stuck up for the cause they believed 
to be right. Not only did they sometimes drop 
out of the shooting parties that made the autumn 
and winter months a joy to them, but their 
women-folk were not wanted at the big houses. 
A man who had his own shooting and a certain 
number of staunch friends of his own class did 
not care ; but the women did. I think it speaks 
well for both sexes that the men never wavered 
in their allegiance to the Liberal party. They 
did suffer for conscience' sake in a way that 
sounds puerile enough, but that made an enor- 
mous amount of difference to the social life of 
the ladies of their families at any rate ! 

The race then was to have the heath-croppers' 
vote, and many wiles were resorted to, to get 
these men to commit themselves to one of the 
two parties, in some way that would ensure a 
victory. I recollect quite well at the first election 
my uncle adding up the votes night after night, 
the dubious votes even at the end of the can- 
vassing being enough to turn the election ; and 
M 177 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

he was somewhat comforted by hearing that the 
other side had marked as doubtful the very same 
votes that he had marked too. When we reached 
the red house the market square was simply 
packed and crammed with folks of all sorts and 
sizes. We were just opposite the hustings, which 
in those days were put up outside the old Town 
Hall, and were in front of the place where criminals 
were detained until they could be dealt with by 
the magistrates. As this was immediately under 
the clock- tower, being " put under the clock " 
was a delicate way of breaking the news of his 
fate to the family of the offender against the 
laws. Here the stocks were always kept, but I 
do not remember their ever being used in my day 
to punish the unhappy prisoners, though I am 
inclined to believe that there are worse ways of 
dealing with orchard thieves, wife-beaters, and 
other disagreeable criminals than this mild 
detention before the mocking eyes of their 
friends and relations! 

In those bygone days the nomination day was 
generally the most exciting, if the most useless 
one, of the two days set apart to determine the 
winner of the fray. As a poll was invariably 
demanded by the candidate who was not satisfied 
with the show of hands (which said show was 
always a farce), the nomination day was a mere 
waste of time, although it was an entertaining 
spectacle for those who looked on behind the 
safe shelter of a good plate-glass window. As I 
178 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

remarked before, we always arrived early on the 
scene, but even then the market square was a 
seething mass of riotous humanity, while promi- 
nent amongst the crowd were two enormous men, 
one armed with a great stake, the other clad in 
a venerable Militia uniform, which I suppose 
he imagined gave him a certain amount of 
authority and importance. 

Presently the candidates themselves hove in 
sight. The Squire from the north rode in at the 
head of his vassals. The labourers were accommo- 
dated in waggons decked with blue ribands, and 
the great horses were wreathed also in the Tory 
colours. The farmers as a rule rode splendid 
animals, for they were one and all ardent hunts- 
men, while yet more horses were bestridden by 
the Squire's neighbours and even the clergy did 
not disdain a place in his train. The Squire 
from the south had a vast following in his turn, 
but it as a rule consisted of a large and dangerous 
crowd of pitmen from the neighbouring clay- 
works, who were one and all spoiling for a fight. 
The appearance of the candidates and their 
supporters on the hustings was the sign for the 
most appalling noise to be started. In vain the 
candidates, their proposers and seconders, en- 
deavoured to make themselves heard ; if there 
were a moment's cessation of the groans and 
cheers the two men mentioned before howled 
out a continuous chant of " Our Squire for iver ; 
throw 'tother in the river.'* But as a rule it 

179 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

was utterly impossible to hear a word of either 
speech. Finally some of the clay-pit rout 
thrust dolls on long sticks into the face of the 
northern Squire, meaning to draw attention by 
these means to his well-known amatory adven- 
tures ; while a couple of other dissentients cast 
loaves of bread in his face. His sayings about 
dear food and his dealings with his farmers were 
well known ; and as one of his favourite remedies 
for the supposed lack of prosperity among the 
landowners and farmers was a tax on wheat; 
and a return to Protection was his panacea for all 
ills, these sentiments had naturally made him 
more than usually unpopular, with the lower 
classes at any rate. In those bygone days the 
poor recollected too well what Protection meant 
to be deluded into voting for a man who advocated 
returning to the bad old times once more. Not 
that the very poor had a vote ; all the same they 
could and did make a most tremendous noise, 
which increased every moment. Presently the 
crusty half of a loaf flew straight against the 
window of the Town Hall, which it smashed, and 
a most fearful row ensued. The farmers, armed 
with their heavy hunting-crops, rushed from the 
hustings and struck out right and left. The clay- 
pit men retaliated; but they were not in full 
force, and they were soon rapidly getting the 
worst of it. Indeed, the two big men were being 
thrust out of the town, when a batch of about 
thirty of their friends was seen rushing in over 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

the bridge, waving huge paUngs which they had 
seized as they came along, and breathing fire and 
slaughter ; and all bid fair to murder each other, 
when fortunately the gigantic police inspector 
and his constables turned out. The clay-pit men 
were rather more than " half-seas over " ; the 
stout inspector and his men went behind them ; 
and while the inspector clasped their arms behind 
their backs one by one, the constables disarmed 
them ; and prominent men on the pink and blue 
sides respectively intervened and persuaded the 
belligerents to cease warfare until the day of the 
poll at all events. 

It was entirely due to the fact that the clay- 
pit men had announced that if the pinks wished 
it, the blues should never enter the town that 
blood was not really shed in quarts. Early in 
the morning they had refused to work as usual 
and were arming for the fray, when news came 
into the town of what they intended to do. 
One of the pinks went off on his pony and met 
them coming in ; by judicious cajolement and 
promises of free beer he distributed the men 
over an area of about four or five miles on the 
southern side, and kept them well occupied. 
They had become almost quiet, when women tore 
out from the town screaming that the blues were 
murdering their comrades. Then nothing would 
hold them, and if the blues had not departed at 
once there is no doubt that most serious riots 
would have taken place. As it was the pinks 

i8i 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

contented themselves by smashing every pane 
of glass in the blue hotel : which, by the irony 
of fate, belonged to the most prominent Liberal 
in the town : and by smacking the heads of 
any blues left in the place who had sufficient 
hardihood to show themselves in the public 
streets. 

When the day of the poll came the excitement 
grew every moment. In those days the state 
of the poll was shown from hour to hour by 
numbers on boards hung on the hustings, and 
the agents flew about from place to place counting 
up votes, and looking up absentees and bring- 
ing them in, to write their names down, or put 
their marks under the eagle eye of the returning 
officer. 

Our colour being pink, my aunt had decked us 
all out in oleanders that she had grown and 
carefully cultivated for the occasion. But her 
efforts at decoration were eclipsed by one frantic 
adherent to the cause, who promenaded the town 
clad in a full costume of pink ! Pink shiny 
cotton stuff formed the many-flounced crinoletted 
dress ; pink feathers waved in the pink hat ; and 
the waving of a pink parasol led the cheers when 
the pink Squire headed the poll, and retired 
meekly into temporary obscurity when the blue 
man went ahead and our hopes fell to freezing- 
point. 

The poll closed then at four o'clock, and 
at three we reluctantly discovered that every 
182 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

known vote was recorded save and except the 
doubtful seven, who had not been seen or heard of. 
Messengers both blue and pink were despatched 
hot-foot, and the blue man was beginning to look 
most disagreeably triumphant. The clay -pit 
men went for the farmers, and the farmers and 
even the gentry joined in the fray ; even my 
beloved " Idstone " of the Field flew to the 
rescue of a small blue farmer, and used his fists 
to such excellent effect that he rescued the man 
at once, and left the clay-pit man amazed at 
such a display of " muscular Christianity." 
Still the time went on, and the seven voters were 
still absent. The moments crept by. If they 
turned up and voted pink the Liberal was in by 
a bare majority of five; if blue, the state of the 
poll would still be in the northern Squire's favour. 
But just before the time a carriage came gallop- 
ing into the market square, and out the seven 
tumbled; and as all to a man voted pink our 
candidate was in; and the fearful noise that 
ensued will never be forgotten by any one who 
ever heard it. It turned out that the blue agent, 
having been driven to despair by the vacillation 
of the seven, had inveigled them out to an island 
in the estuary known as Horse Island, where horses 
were taken to be out at grass. He knew that, 
deprived of this unknown quantity, the election 
was safe as far as his side was concerned ; and after 
inspecting a horse or two that these men had for 
sale, he had made for the boat and left them on the 

183 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

island cursing. They were safe there until the tide 
turned at least, and by then the election would 
be over and won ! Unfortunately the noise the 
prisoners made was heard by some fishermen in 
the harbour ; they came to their rescue, and the 
men were brought off in time to punish the agent 
by voting as they never intended to do, until 
he played them this dastardly trick. 

The declaration of the poll was followed by 
another free fight, until some one persuaded the 
Squire and his escort to depart. And lucky for 
them they went ! The last man had scarcely 
vanished before the whole of the clay-pit men 
rushed into the town, breathing fire and slaughter. 
At last nightfall brought peace ; the last of the 
belligerents were interned " under the clock," 
and all were frankly delighted that the day was 
over. 

The next election was somewhat remarkable 
by reason of the fact that some of the more 
particular members of the County had revolted 
against the yoke of the northern Squire, and had 
provided themselves with a candidate of their 
own. One or two of the landowners put up 
weird structures in the meadows to give their 
servants votes who were outside the borough ; 
but the northern Squire put up two to their one 
on the other side of the town, and still hoped to 
win. That he did not was owing to the fact 
that the Tory vote was split. But I do not recollect 
much about that election, and I do not think I 
184 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

was there on the day, though I saw a good many 
of the election squibs, and was mightily amused 
by most of them. 

The first experience I personally had of what 
I call " cultivating the constituency," and which 
has now become a fine art; was when a certain 
man appeared on the scene, no one exactly knew 
from where; and began to spend money hand 
over fist. He was the head of an extraordinary 
insurance office, run on most astute lines in 
connection with some building society, and was 
intended sooner or later to make the fortune of 
every one who trusted their money in his hands. 
He had enlisted the sympathy of the Rector, 
the doctor, and the lawyer; and the Church school- 
master was his factotum. He was to represent 
all the highest possible Tory traditions, and was 
to be bluer than the bluest blue that had ever 
come our way. He gave a stupendous challenge 
cup to be shot for by the local Volunteer corps ; 
he sent game and most expensive fruit to the 
Volunteer dinner ; and, in fact, no one asked him 
for or hinted at anything that was wanted but 
it arrived immediately upon the scene. This 
stream of benevolence, as far as I recollect, went 
on for about a year before the election came off. 
Every one was to be made rich in due course by 
his system of insurance ; in the meantime no 
one was to lack food, fuel, or blankets if he knew 
they were in want of either commodity. There 
were one or two people who were not taken in 

185 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

by him, and my husband happened to be of the 
few. I am sure we had no money to invest in 
his scheme ; we never had to invest in anything 
outside our immediate occupation, and Uttle 
enough even for that ; but somehow or other 
the man inspired distrust. The challenge cup 
and the fruit and game were sufficient annoyances ; 
and I think that though this latter was accepted 
it was merely put out on a side-table and not 
used, but I am not sure. Anyhow, the election 
came on ; the man was at the bottom of the poll, 
and never came near the town again. I cannot 
understand now why he hoped to represent us 
in the House, for he had not been gone from 
our ken for more than a few days, or weeks at 
most: it is nearly forty years ago, and at this 
distance of time it is difficult to recollect the 
exact space: when the town woke up to hear 
that the insurance company had gone smash ! 
Every one lost all he or she had invested, and the 
distress was fearful. For in a smaller way he 
anticipated the fiasco of the Liberator com- 
pany, and for many a year gentle and simple 
alike suffered from the cruel, heartless conduct 
of the man. While he was amongst us he was 
full of ideas and plans for making money, but 
perhaps the most ludicrous one he held forth on 
was that of extracting gold out of sea-water. 
Many, many years after he had left us to our own 
devices, some one of the same name promoted, 
or I should say tried to promote, a company of 
i86 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

a somewhat similar nature. Truth, invaluable 
militant Truth, took that company in hand; 
and I think that no one nowadays believes in 
such an idiotic idea. 

The next election was after the ballot came in, 
and it was impossible to make the less educated 
electors believe in the fact that this made their 
votes their own at last. It was then not to the 
advantage of the Tories that this belief should 
grow, and the canvassers on that side sedulously 
informed the voters that though the ballot was 
apparently secret a scrutiny was always possible ; 
and that, moreover, they had ways and means 
of discovering how any of their tenants voted, 
were they disposed to use them. Even a well- 
educated man, as education went in those days, 
could not be convinced that his vote was his own 
and he could do what he liked with it. Dissent was 
very strong in the town, and Dissenters are always 
Radical to the core ; and this special man was a 
Dissenter, and though not a Radical as things 
are nowadays, was a distinct Liberal. We had 
often discussed public matters, and when I went 
to talk with him about the election, instead of 
finding him, as I had hoped he would be, a 
jubilant and open supporter of the cause we both 
had so much at heart, I discovered him sad, 
morose, and almost tearful, while he declared 
that he dared not vote as he desired ; ballot or 
no ballot, every one would be sure to know 
which side he had taken. He made the liveries 

187 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

of all the " carriage folk " round for miles ; few 
indeed among our ranks required liveries ; he 
had been told by the Tories they would stop 
their work if the Liberal got in, and that they 
knew in every case what votes they could count 
on and whose were dubious, and would act accord- 
ingly when the time came. His bread depended 
on pleasing the gentry ; he could not starve ; 
and though I told him what I steadfastly believed 
to be true, that no one on earth could tell how 
he voted, his confidence was shaken by seeing 
one of the Coimty standing at the door by which 
one entered the polling booth, who promptly 
asked him for whom he intended to vote ; while 
the Tory candidate button- holed him as he came 
out and thanked him profusely for " doing his 
duty," as he put it, when he heard the vote had 
gone to him. That during the next few weeks 
most of the people round required new liveries 
or clothes of sorts, confirmed him in his melan- 
choly belief that his vote was not his own. At 
the same time before he died he had more than 
one chance of voting as he wished. The borough 
had ceased to be, and a wider range to work over 
had given him freedom, from the pressing attentions 
of a local and powerful candidate for the seat. 

The last borough election at which we had 
really very much to do was one of the most 
entertaining of the lot ; but I really do wonder 
we survived the fearsome amount of work it 
entailed, to say nothing of the manner in which 
i88 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

we were ostracised for the time by all our more 
superior acquaintances. We had not imbibed 
old-fashioned Liberal principles for nothing, and 
neither then nor at any other election had we 
ever told our men how we wished them to vote. 
They knew for whom we were working ; they 
had talks on legislation ; they were given papers 
of both sides to read ; but we never had or never 
would suggest that a man should vote for any 
one to please us, or even vote at all unless he 
understood what he was doing. But several of 
the Liberals wanted us to get our men to promise ; 
otherwise they would not know how they stood. 
All the same we did not interfere ; we talked 
"ballot" for all it was worth; and after endless 
struggles we reached the day of the poll no wiser 
about our fate than we were before the strenuous 
fight began. 

I shall never forget that day as long as I live. 
The red house was now part of the inn, which, 
owned as it was by a staunch Tory, was yet the 
Liberal stronghold, in the same way that the 
other inn, though owned by, a Liberal, was the 
Tory headquarters ; and we were early on the 
scene. Large pink rosettes adorned all our 
adherents ; but the blue ribands of the opponents 
outnumbered the pink by hundreds, and our 
hopes sank slowly into our boots. Though there 
were several free fights, the elections of that day, 
and, indeed, of the present time, are nothing like 
as entertaining as they were before the ballot; 

189 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

neither were there any hustings or anything 
special to see. Carriages dashed up full to 
overflowing with " free and independent " electors, 
all bearing the fatal blue ; but presently one cart 
drove up with a most unpopular couple of farmers 
in. The crowd muttered, cursed, finally yelled, 
until some one whose will was law then to the 
town, plunged down boldly into the fray, parted 
the crowd, and dragged the couple into our inn. 
The younger had struck out at the men in the 
street with his whip ; it had been wrested from 
him and broken across his shoulders; and I am 
sure father and son would both have been slain 
had they not been dragged out of sight of the 
infuriated mob. Finally they had to be smuggled 
out of the town by the back entrance to the inn, 
which opened into the little-frequented lanes ; 
but even then they went out ignominiously in a 
pig cart, covered with sacks and accompanied 
by three or four full-sized pigs to completely 
hide them from the furious people. 

We had had two or three of the hardest workers 
among the townspeople on our side, and before 
the final day we had been besieged by them and 
their emissaries morning, noon, and night. One 
of them was particularly fond of discussing the 
most awful " conspiracies," " briberies," and 
" corruptions," and would act in a most mysterious 
manner when he came to unmask the villain to 
us. He would usually ring very softly at the 
front door and then retire ; the servant replied 
190 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

to the bell, but there was apparently no one 
there ; she would go out into the road to see if 
she could see the delinquent, who had apparently- 
rung and run away, when he would slip into the 
hall and glide into whatever room we were in. 
Then he would put his finger on his lips, say 
" Hush ! " very loud, and would finally sink into 
a chair exhausted. Then in a few minutes he 
would edge himself quite close to us, getting 
closer and closer until our faces nearly touched, 
when he would proclaim suddenly the matter 
about which he had called, which was generally 
something of the most idiotic and trivial nature. 
His conscience delivered, he would rise, tiptoe 
to the door, which he would open very slowly ; 
then with another " Hush ! " he would disappear, 
until he had discovered another mare's nest, 
which he would once more display to us in the 
same bewildering style. 

A second supporter was the hardest worker 
for what he termed the Cause I have ever met. 
The Liberals were badly treated; about that 
there is no manner of doubt. All the same a 
long course of snubbing, misrepresentation, and 
unkindness had used us to what we had to endure 
at election times, and we had long ceased to care. 
Not so had our helper ; he used literally to burn 
with rage and foam at the mouth when he un- 
earthed any specially dubious Tory tactics, and 
I never went through an election with him without 
expecting him to expire at my feet. 

191 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

Perhaps the most entertaining supporter had 
been recommended to us by Kegan Paul, the 
publisher, who in my time was vicar of a country 
parish, and who was on the verge of giving up 
his orders and starting in London on more 
congenial work and in a more congenial atmo- 
sphere. I have indeed rarely, if ever, met a 
harder worker or a more consistent man than 
Kegan Paul's protege. He began life with us 
in a small ordinary country shop, with nothing 
particularly interesting about him ; now he is the 
John Burns of the place, an "absolutely honest 
merchant," as Ruskin spoke of his father ; and 
those who live will see his grandsons men of mark 
and members of the County, if there be any County 
left when their time to exercise the franchise comes. 

These three men were extremely low-spirited 
over our prospects as the day went on, and we 
were nearly all weeping in concert when the poll 
closed and I wended my weary way home to 
look after my dinner, to which the candidate, 
his sister and brother-in-law and other folks were 
coming. Now our candidate, though a Liberal, 
was the grandson of a duke, and his relations 
were likewise gorgeous folk, and I had that 
dinner very much on my mind. I went upstairs, 
and, meeting the governess, I remarked, " I 
believe we have failed after all our trouble." 
" I always thought you would," she replied with 
a sniff, and passed on with her charges into the 
schoolroom. 
192 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

My table looked beautiful, and my good little 
cook assured me my dinner was quite all right, 
and I proceeded into the drawing-room in fair 
spirits. We were half-way through a most success- 
ful feast, and only half-way, when suddenly the 
most appalling turmoil that was ever heard 
burst on our astonished ears. The ballot-boxes 
had been brought in from the outlying stations 
with unexampled speed ; the votes had been 
counted ; we were ahead by, I think, twenty- 
four votes ; and all the town. Conservative as 
well as Liberal, appeared to have emptied itself 
into our house and garden. One man stood on 
a chair waving a napkin round his head ; another 
helped himself to a glass of wine, of which he 
stood sorely in need ; while yet a third fell prone 
into an armchair, and had to be fanned and given 
brandy before he recovered his normal state of 
health. To this day I do not know how we raced 
from our house to the inn, but we all got there 
somehow, to find both legal gentlemen (long 
since dead) very much the worse for liquor under 
a large table ; while the lady who wore the pink 
costume when I was a child made for our member ; 
hugged him round the neck and kissed him ; 
while he looked first at me, then at the other 
ladies, evidently wondering if he would have to 
salute the lot. We spared him any embarrass- 
ment by discreetly effacing ourselves, and fled, 
while the pink lady made a speech from one 
window while the member made another from 
N 193 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

another, and all went as merry as several marriage 
bells. Poor man ! I think that embrace had 
given him a somewhat unfortunate idea of the 
ladies' committee, for very soon after he sent us 
each a large parcel and a letter of thanks andpraise. 
I returned my parcel without opening it, merely 
writing a civil note to say I did not want any 
remembrance of the day, for I should certainly 
never forget it. He was foolish enough to call 
and offer me other " articles," but at last I 
impressed on him it was not what he sent, but 
the idea of a present, I objected to; and he had 
to content himself with the thanks of the other 
members of the committee. They, unfortunately, 
had not returned the parcels, though they were 
one and all annoyed at the gifts. However, 
they never decorated their drawing-rooms with 
the things, as the member suggested, and I think 
he learned that we all did our work for the Cause, 
and neither for him individually nor for the hope 
of a reward. 

By the way, that election saw the last appear- 
ance of the Tory Squire in the place. He came 
out on the porch of the inn to make his farewell 
speech after the declaration of the poll, but when 
he was received with derisive yells and screams 
by the victorious party he turned green with 
rage ; paused for a minute to obtain silence, and 
then solemnly and completely cursed the town 
and the inhabitants thereof in the most appalling 
manner possible. Then he called for his coach- 
194 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

man and told him to put in his horses and drive 
him straight to the warmest locaUty known. 
The man looked amazed, and faltered out that 
he did not know the way ; but the Squire, with 
another loud oath, swore he would soon show 
him, and banged into the carriage, and the last 
thing seen of him was the fist he was indignantly 
shaking at every house and person he passed. 
He never stood again for the borough ; education, 
the ballot, the advance of knowledge, all were 
against him; and the Conservatives knew that 
they must bring forward some one quite different, 
or the borough would remain a Liberal stronghold 
for the rest of its days. 

So the moment that that election was done 
with the other side met and began a system 
that has never ceased from that day to this. 
The wretched member for any country place is 
invariably looked upon as a species of milch 
cow, or universal provider, who can be called 
upon at any moment to supply money for any- 
thing that may be required. Coal funds, blanket 
funds, boot clubs, men's clubs, football and 
cricket clubs, all ask for and obtain subscriptions ; 
the Church makes certain demands, and every 
chapel has, or tries to have, a look in. These 
subscriptions are a mere matter of course. 
Besides these, it is considered the duty of the 
member to provide all sorts and conditions of 
odds and ends. If Jane Smith loses her husband, 
or, indeed, her donkey, the member is written to ; 

195 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

if the town pump requires a new handle the 
member has to provide it ; and I am always 
astonished to find that any man will enter 
Parliament, so many are the calls upon his purse, 
and, indeed, upon his freedom as well. Of course, 
one knows that a man is returned to represent 
the larger part ; at the time ; of his special con- 
stituency, but at all events he might be left a 
free hand. As it is, the least deviation from 
what some one in the constituency thinks the 
straight path causes him to lay himself open to 
a bombardment of letters that is positively cruel. 
After all a man must possess a conscience and 
must be trusted. If he has no conscience and 
cannot be trusted, he is not fit, and he never was 
fit to be a member of any ParHament that ever 
was made. 

It is extraordinary how even now in remote 
country districts the unpopular Liberal party 
is treated by those in authority. I do not blame 
them ; the Radicals are dangerous, unscrupulous 
robbers, and are not sufficiently discipUned 
themselves to be able to discipline others ; all 
the same I do think a little more fairness would 
bring about a better position of affairs all round, 
for sometimes those who should know better do 
the most extraordinary things. I recollect asking 
a parson of more than Liberal tendencies why 
he had voted for a certain man. He said, " Oh, 
because of my duty to the Church." I said, 
" The man is a Jew, and cares no more for the 
196 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

Church than you do for the Synagogue." But 
he was pledged to vote with the Church party, 
and that was enough. The man's tenets, even his 
character, mattered nothing ; he was to vote for 
the Church, and that was deemed sufficient to 
ensure support. Another time I found the poll 
for a particular district was to be taken in a farm- 
house, the farmer being under the thumb of his 
landlord, and both he and his landlord most 
militant, and I may say ignorant, Tories. No 
harm in that, perhaps, but the other side was 
refused the shelter of any spot they could use 
for a committee room; they were four miles 
from a town, food or shelter, and that I could 
find them in all was a mere chance. Anyhow, 
they were not compelled to camp out imder a 
hedge in the snow or rain for at least the next 
two elections, as they had always had to do 
before, and will most certainly have to do again. 
Now I personally would have sheltered either 
party and given either side a fair chance. And 
it may be that after all the Conservatives will 
become equally fair-minded, for already one of 
the few old Tories left has said to me more than 
once that " the party " must cultivate the 
working man's vote ! But electioneering in the 
country gives one a very low idea of human 
nature, and to see a gentleman hobnobbing in the 
market-place and being smacked on the back 
by people he cannot endure makes one very 
sorry for him after all. I used to have great joy 

197 



■■**^'^^^ --^'^-- ■■"-■■■- --- .-^..^> ^ai^^^ ..Jlv^n,.:^. ..., ..:. 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

in watching one particular candidate ; who years 
ago, really did think himself far too much above 
the ordinary herd, to even speak to them except to 
give an order ; and who had no more idea of the 
thousand and one grades in the tiny society of 
the place than I had when I went to live there ; 
or than the King has, if he ever thinks about such 
a subject. He literally used to squirm when the 
farmers accosted him ; the shopkeepers terrified 
him lest he should have to shake hands with 
them ; and as for us ! — he fled before us one and 
all, for he really did not know how to behave to 
us in the very least. Yet if you would permit 
him to be condescending there was not a nicer 
or kinder or more accommodating man. He 
would sing at any concert for anything in a 
sweet tenor voice, and he once was good enough 
to lecture on some subject connected with the 
town. But most egregious fun was made of his 
lecture, and he retired from the fray to look 
after his shooting and the poachers, all of whom 
he invariably treated to the utmost rigour of the 
law. I believe his favourite occupation in the 
house was Berlin wool-work, but as I never saw 
any of his handiwork I cannot vouch for the 
truth of this statement. 

I only wonder that these men were as good 
as they were, so ridiculously were they truckled 
to ; and I always feel sorry for the few of them 
who survive those golden days, for now at any 
rate obsequiousness, and even politeness, have 
198 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

died completely out. Men who used to discuss 
religion and their duty to their masters now 
discuss, and, moreover, understand, Socialism; 
and though the Socialism they long to see can 
never come — and if it did would end England 
altogether — they are most independent folk, and 
have no idea of being civil, if in any way they 
can avoid being so. It remains now for the 
masters to wake up and educate their people. 
Even if the Squire of the north were alive he 
could no longer ride in at the head of his angry 
but obsequious farmers ; they might accompany 
him, for they have some idea that Tariff Reform 
will come from the Tories and that the golden 
days before the repeal of the corn-laws will be 
brought about by Protection once more. But 
they have forgotten that the labourers are not 
what they were, half-starved, badly housed, 
working for a sodden crust, and their children 
working too, to put a morsel in their half-famished 
mouths. The labourer of that time has ceased 
to exist ; he is a man, often enough an unpleasant 
man, open to beer, most certainly open to a bribe 
still, but he will not slave silently as his forebears 
did ; he knows what he wants, and he means to 
get it either by fair means or foul. Lowering of 
the franchise and the ballot have made the elector 
free to vote as he likes and have put an enormous 
power into most unfitting hands. It is a pity 
there seems no one strong enough to guide the 
masses and to save them from the evils of the 

199 



'(tliilllliiijrii^iMMniiiiiii I r -| — - - — -— -—ihiMiriiii 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

paid agitator, who thinks first of his pocket and 
his position and not at all about his unhappy 
country. As some one very justly says, the cry 
nowadays is not " What can I do for my country ? " 
but " What can my country give me that I have 
neither earned nor deserved ? " 

Our elections were hard fights fairly won and 
fought by the old-time Liberals, who had neither 
money nor position, and only principles to fight 
with. Now every one is "on the make," and 
until a man is obliged to put his name himself 
on the register or lose his vote, or until personal 
canvassing and conveying to the poll are made 
illegal, no elector can be considered independent. 
But I fear the millennium is too far off for these 
desirable ideas to become facts yet awhile. 

The most disagreeable feature about our 
elections was the fact that for months after one 
of them, there was great coolness between families 
even, if the members thereof had taken opposite 
sides. Friends crossed over the road to avoid 
speaking, heated arguments melted the bonds 
of affection, and a most disagreeable period always 
followed on the time of storm and stress that we 
had just gone through. Why politics should 
mean fighting I do not know ; anyhow they used 
to, and in our day we most certainly had our 
share. The Tories had one more advantage 
over us, and that is they could always ask their 
constituents in posse or esse to shoot ; and this 
in a thoroughly sporting neighbourhood was a 

200 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

great advantage. It would have been still 
greater had the owners of the shooting had the 
smallest idea of discriminating between Jones 
and Brown when they sent out their invitations. 
But as, happily for the other side, they neither 
did nor could discriminate, they made far more 
enemies than adherents by asking the doctors 
and lawyers to shoot with the farmers, or even 
the innkeepers. Moreover, the fact that, as a 
rule, the shoot took place nearer the rabbit 
warrens than the pheasant coverts made the 
sportsmen furious, and more than once resulted 
in their taking the matter into their own hands 
and shooting hen and cock pheasants alike ; 
although the first of February was most perilously 
near, when the hens are supposed to be sacred 
from any attempt to take their lives. Very 
often, too, unbroken dogs were brought out by 
the lower orders, dogs which appeared to answer 
to the name of "Hi, you ! " And while these gave 
endless trouble, other dogs were yet more disliked. 
These were of the lurcher tribe, and more than 
once suddenly sprang forward and caught a 
pheasant, which they brought to their masters 
with the knowing smile a poacher's dog always 
gives when he has proved his prowess among the 
game. Nowadays all this is altered ; the Squires 
have all disappeared ; shooting tenants come and 
go much as meteors do ; there is little of the old 
indirect bribery by the resident gentry, for there 
are none left to bribe, and the seat goes as a rule 

'201 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

to the man who promises most legislation for 
the working classes, who expect an immediate 
wave of prosperity, and who have not the least 
idea how it is going to be obtained. 

I, however, state boldly that there is far more 
general prosperity in and round the town than 
there was in our time, though how it is obtained 
I do not know. The tradespeople live in the old 
houses, the bailiff's son in my uncle's old house, 
the breweries are closed and used as mere store- 
houses for the beer of one gigantic firm that 
dominates the neighbourhood, and the tan-pits 
have long since ceased to be. But the river has 
a fleet of boats where once six made the full 
complement ; the lanes are covered by swift 
bicycle parties, every boy and girl in the place 
apparently being able to buy and own a bicycle 
of a kind ; and no one is afraid of his superiors, 
if, indeed, there are any superiors to be found. 
This surely is a better state of things than in the 
" good old times " of Parliamentary elections, 
when votes were the property of the landlord 
and not of the tenant ; and it makes for freedom 
and independence in a way that would have 
been impossible forty years ago. I was amused 
to see after the last election that a bold attempt 
at coercion was met by most emphatic measures. 
A lady wrote a furious letter denouncing a local 
tradesman for daring to vote and encourage others 
to vote for the Liberal candidate, and forbidding 
him ever to come to her house to attempt to 

203 



FREE AND INDEPENDENT ELECTORS 

dispose of his wares there. Every paper in 
London on the Radical side fell upon the writer, 
who, despite her position, was threatened with 
penalties for " intimidation," and she had to 
withdraw her epistle. In my time the tradesman 
would have been ruined ; now boycotting cannot 
take place, the ubiquitous newspaper is to the 
fore, and the attempted tyranny is nipped in 
the bud. 

My personal feelings are with the old Squires 
and landed gentry, and I honestly do not like 
the onward march of the masses ; all the same 
I must confess that they have a much better time 
now than they ever had, and are far more as 
** free and independent electors " should be than 
they ever were forty or even thirty years ago. 



203 



CHAPTER VIII 

DEFENDERS OF THEIR COUNTRY 

It remains to be seen how the new Territorial 
Army scheme will work out, but it will have to 
be indeed most excellent if it is to replace in 
any way the much- scorned, much- derided old 
Volunteer brigades. I was a much-interested 
spectator at the birth of the Volunteer movement 
of 1859-60, and though I was but a small girl 
I was truly enthusiastic, and followed its develop- 
ment with mingled awe and delight. That it 
came into being as far as I personally was con- 
cerned in a part of England that had not forgotten 
the terror of the first Napoleon made it doubly 
interesting. For there were, of course, those still 
surviving who had enrolled themselves as defenders 
of their country in the very early days of the 
century; and had had many a wakeful night 
looking out for the lighting of the beacons, which 
should tell them that the dreaded tyrant had 
landed, and they must at once prepare manfully 
to defend their hearths and homes. Indeed, 
these same people were quite angry that the 
204 



DEFENDERS OF THEIR COUNTRY 

idea of reviving the beacons was scouted. Of 
course the telegraph had superseded such primi- 
tive means of communication ; all the same wires 
could be cut; and, moreover, storms had been 
known to rise suddenly out of the sea and make 
communication, especially in and from the island, 
quite impossible. Now a good beacon would 
always be in evidence : for the light flashed from 
headland to headland would carry its message 
swiftly on the darkest night. It was madness 
not to avail themselves of such a simple and 
sufficient safeguard, and it was only stubbornness 
and extreme youth which never would listen to 
the advice of its elders, that would refrain from 
taking a hint from the past while it was yet time ! 
Napoleon III. was invariably a true and loyal 
friend to England, but the vapouring of some 
of his officers after their successes in Italy had 
reached English ears. It is always easy to raise 
a scare. The Crimea was forgotten ; the fact that 
we had fought shoulder to shoulder there with 
the French might never have existed. No ! 
France meditated a raid ; we must be ready at 
once to repel the ruthless invader at any cost ! 
All the ancient tales about Bonaparte were 
revived, and the older people along the coast 
became most curiously mixed in their ideas of the 
two men. Indeed, some expected to find the 
tomb in Les Invalides had given up its dead, and 
that the fateful figure of " Le Petit Caporal " 
would be seen standing with folded arms on the 

205 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

coast of our particular part of the island, coming 
at last to add us to his erstwhile numerous con- 
quests. There are many scaremongers of the 
present day who awake each morning expecting 
to see the wearers of the German " Pickelhaube " 
peering over their front gates. I myself have 
felt uncomfortably aware, when I lived in an 
isolated place close to the sea-coast; that there 
was nothing whatever to prevent him should he 
choose to come, though how he was to be fed 
and then get away home again I for one do not 
know. But this scare is nothing to the dread 
that Napoleon, any Napoleon, should arise and 
come in his thousands to seize on our country 
and make it his own; which existed for years, 
and, indeed, until the last Napoleon died fighting 
on our side in Zululand. Now it is only transferred 
in a manner to the German, who, I believe, wants 
us about as little as we desire to wipe him and 
his navy off the surface of the seven seas. 

The French scare had been indeed a real and 
most definite one. I have spoken to an old lady 
who saw Napoleon land in Lulworth Cove, and 
the account she gave me of the event is one I 
never forgot, and which I may as well reproduce 
here ; as it will illustrate how real was the reason 
for the terror that the mere name of Bonaparte 
inspired, in the early days of the nineteenth 
century. French was a language scarcely ever 
learned in those days ; everything French was 
loathed with a deadly hatred ; but my old friend's 
206 



DEFENDERS OF THEIR COUNTRY 

father was a china merchant, who had deaUngs 
with the Sevres pottery works, and she had had 
to learn French to help him with his correspon- 
dence and conversations, with the travellers who 
came over from that hated country to obtain 
china-clay; and show patterns and designs for 
china to the English warehouses. My friend 
was born in the year 1784, and therefore was a 
young girl at the time of the Terror, of which 
she had one most dramatic recollection. One 
of the Sevres men came into the office, and she 
was sent for to act as interpreter. He gave a 
gruesome description of the streets of Paris, and 
had, moreover, seen the head of the Princesse 
de Lamballe carried past his windows on a pike. 
Any sign of pity for the unfortunate creature 
would have been dangerous indeed, but he could 
hardly refrain from tears when describing the 
tragedy, and he added : " Horrible ! most horrible ! 
But she looked so pretty I could have kissed her ! " 
Naturally this did not add to her affection for 
the French nation, and when she came south as 
" travelling bridesmaid " with her sister, who had 
married the clay-merchant, who furnished her 
father with the fine white china-clay, which is 
only found in one part of England ; she hated it 
still more. All England was seething with rage 
over the aggressions of Bonaparte, and living 
as she did close to the coast she was never allowed 
to forget that at any moment he might appear 
and sweep the English into his net. When she 

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FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

married she went to live close to her sister, and 
among the hills that overlooked the sea, her 
husband being one of the old yeoman farmers, 
a valuable type of man that is fast ceasing to 
exist. He was too close to the sea to refrain 
from smuggling : indeed, no one did refrain in 
those days, and gentle and simple alike all joined 
gladly in defrauding his Majesty's revenue. The 
press-gang also was a terror, and when the hus- 
band did not return at his usual hour the wife 
suffered agonies of torment from imagination lest 
he should have fallen into the hands of the 
preventive officers, or been pressed into the 
service of the king's navy. One special night 
he was so late that she could no longer stay 
indoors, and she set out over the hills to look for 
her missing spouse. She knew that a special 
cargo was expected, and that the preventive 
officers were drawn away to a great dinner, given 
by one of the gentry, whose position put him 
above the suspicion that was yet most un- 
doubtedly his due. Still he did not return, and 
she went on and on until she found herself running 
down the hill that leads into the Cove. She 
had seen a suspicious-looking ship standing in 
near the land. Could this be the Revenue cutter 
after all ? and were the men on the look-out 
for the cargo that must at the moment be in 
the act of being run in ? As she reached the 
Cove a long-boat came rowing swiftly and 
silently into the moonlit space, and she had just 
208 



DEFENDERS OF THEIR COUNTRY 

time to lie flat down behind some rocks when the 
boat's keel grated on the shore, and two men 
got out of the boat, while the sailors kept her 
afloat so as to be ready to push off once more in 
a moment should they be disturbed. Descrip- 
tion had made her famiHar with the appearance 
of Napoleon ; to her horror she recognised him ; 
and by Hstening to his conversation she discovered 
that he was discussing with one of his officers 
whether it were possible to land his soldiers on 
that particular portion of the coast. They had 
a map, over which they pored for a few minutes, 
which naturally enough appeared to her hours ; 
finally Napoleon shrugged his shoulders, folded 
the map, and, ejaculating " Impossible ! " went 
back to the boat, and he and his officer were 
rowed quickly out of the Cove into the open sea. 
The instant they were away she rose to her feet 
and ran for all she was worth up the coastguard 
path to the look-out. There was the frigate; 
and she remained watching until the boat reached 
her ; the men ascended the side, and the frigate 
slipped away in the broad moonlight out towards 
France. Hardy tells the tale of Napoleon's 
landing as heard from an old shepherd, but his 
story, he confesses, is a romance, a mere echo from 
the gossip of the countryside. I have my story 
from the Ups of the woman who saw it, who lived 
to be about a hundred and four, and who had 
many an interesting story to tell of those hard- 
hitting, fighting, and suffering times. When she 
o 209 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

had been married fifty years she rode on horse- 
back all round the farm with her old husband, 
to whom she was devoted, and with whom she 
became acquainted when she came south as 
" travelling bridesmaid " with the sister I have 
spoken of before. Her husband died very many 
years before she did, and one day she was talking 
about her early married days, and I asked her 
in what form she thought she would see him 
when she met him again after death, as she 
most emphatically believed she would do. She 
thought for a moment, and then she said : "I 
shall see him as I saw him first, climbing up the 
hills to meet me with the sunset in his face. 
It was the sunset then ; now it will be the 
sunrise, and the hills will be Heaven's hills. 
Yes, I shall see him first again, climbing the 
hills to meet me with the sunshine in his face ! " 
And I am quite certain that she had not the least 
doubt that that would indeed be their meeting. 

Yet another woman told me that in her young 
days, the dread of the press-gang was so great 
that when two of her sons were taken, the third, 
whenever the gang was about, used to hide in a 
great drain-pipe that lay out on the heather. 
Here she would take her seat, apparently minding 
the few geese that were her sole means of support ; 
if any one hove in sight she was hard at work 
on the button-making ; if no one was about she 
read the newspaper to her son, or any book she 
could lay her hands on, to make his imprisonment 

210 



DEFENDERS OF THEIR COUNTRY 

in the drain-pipe as little irksome as she possibly 
could. 

Then were there not old Waterloo and Penin- 
sular fighters still in the town primed with stories 
of Bonaparte and of all they had endured ? One 
man had been at the siege of Badajos, and he 
it was who told of how the scaling-ladders were 
sent for for the final assault, but that before 
they came the dead bodies of his comrades were 
piled so high that they did not need the ladders ; 
they climbed over their dead friends, and, inflamed 
by rage and hatred, took the town by assault 
and put the defenders to slaughter as soon as 
ever they could. At the mere idea of inva- 
sion the old heroes crept out of the almshouse 
and cottages into the market-place, fought their 
battles over once more, and inflamed their hearers 
by their stories, until it was impossible to prevent 
any single man from volunteering on the spot, 
even if any one had been so unpatriotic as to 
suggest such a thing. The women were most 
eager to arm their husbands, sons, and lovers ; 
the children, of whom I was one, were taught to 
play " The Rifleman's Polka " ; my aunts sang 
" Form, form, riflemen, form " ; and all who could 
work embroidered a species of fancy coat- of- arms, 
consisting of the borough seal supported on each 
side by riflemen in full uniform ; the crest was 
a rifleman's shako, and the motto below the 
whole fearsome arrangement was " Defence, not 
defiance." I think some of the more learned 

311 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

ladies burst into the Latin for " For hearth and 
home," but I never saw this, my aunt being 
contented with a sentiment in which she most 
thoroughly agreed. There was great disappoint- 
ment when it became known that a rifle brigade 
is not allowed to possess colours. A vast scheme 
for working the flag was already on foot, but 
had to be dropped, and the work was confined 
to what were called banner screens; which in 
some cases were mounted on poles, and in others 
on a species of frame which screwed on the 
mantelpiece, and which arrangement was sup- 
posed to protect the eyes from the glare of the 
fire, and has long since fallen into utter disuse. 
The difficulty was not to find men in those days, 
but to pick out from those who volunteered in 
the widest sense of the word those who would 
be most useful if the worst came to the worst. 
The country gentlemen came in with their 
stalwart gamekeepers; the farmers crowded in 
with their labourers ; and the principal townsmen 
came forward at once, and brought in their train 
their servants, who were to a man literally 
spoiling for a fight. The danger of invasion was 
really believed to be so imminent that the men 
began to drill the moment their belts and bayonets 
were served out to them ; and many of the pictures 
in Punch of that day were not in the least exag- 
gerated. Stout fathers of families, their coats 
dragged in round their middles by the belts, 
resolutely practised the goose-step, and we used 

212 



DEFENDERS OF THEIR COUNTRY 

to repair to the Town Hall to watch the drill, and 
smile at the way in which imperious masters were 
lectured by the drill-sergeant, and put through 
their facings without the smallest difference 
made between them and their men. The sterner 
sex are always credited with the idea that dress 
is nothing whatever to them, but no girls pre- 
paring for their first ball were ever more excited 
than the new-made citizen-soldiers over the 
shape, colour, and style of their uniform. Great 
discussions ensued, particularly over the colour; 
and I think if the founders of the force could 
see what is now worn they would have a fit. 
Green, invisible green, was surely the best tint, 
they said, for men who would probably fight 
among the green hills and lanes of England ; 
what would they have remarked could they have 
beheld the present khaki, useful enough, no 
doubt, on the arid veldt or on a dry hillside, 
but looking as if it ought to be prominent indeed 
in the place where alone presumably it is to be 
used? Fortunately our choice was soon made, 
though grey was contemplated and some of the 
younger and more ambitious souls longed for 
scarlet; but the colonel was an old colonel of 
the Rifle Brigade ; his choice fell naturally on his 
own uniform, with a few small alterations ; the 
sealed patterns came down, and the local tailors 
fell to work, and were never so busy before, and 
I should say have certainly never been so over- 
worked since. 

213 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

After the uniform question was settled the 
officers were at once intent on the rifles. The 
Crimean War had demonstrated the power of 
the new rifle ; and not one man doubted that, 
once armed with this formidable weapon, Eng- 
lishmen would be able to keep the foe at bay. 
If bowmen had protected their homes in the 
bygone days, surely the rifle was more than 
powerful enough to do the same, for when the 
hedgerows were lined with skilled marksmen, no 
enemy could possibly expect to escape with his life. 

Once the question of the uniform was settled 
no one spoke of any other subject but rifles and 
rifle-shooting. The men were armed with the 
Snyder or Snyder-Enfield, a muzzle-loading rifle, 
as used in the Crimea, of which there were two 
patterns, one for the infantry, the long Enfield, 
the other for the artillery, the short Enfield. 
The short ramrod was also used as a cleaning rod, 
and was often missing at the end of a field-day, 
the zealous riflemen having forgotten to remove 
them before firing ; and, moreover, I can state as 
a fact that the desperate insult of the question, 
" Who shot the dog ? " levelled then at our men 
by the ever-rude street urchin, was deserved 
on more than one occasion, and could never be 
satisfactorily replied to, if truth were adhered to, 
at any rate. All the same these said rifles made 
Volunteering anything but play- work. The locks 
were most elaborate, and the parts thereof had 
to be accurately known by any one who was 
214 



DEFENDERS OF THEIR COUNTRY 

ambitious of qualifying as a musketry instructor, 
or of bearing the marksman's badge of crossed 
rifles on the sleeve. The manual exercise was 
a severe task, with its position drill, its loading 
and aiming drill ; and the work was made heavier 
by the men being taught in batches by a drill 
instructor; who often enough lost his patience 
and had a hard struggle not to talk to the gentle- 
men he was teaching, as he would have done to 
the ordinary " Tommy," with whom he was 
decidedly more at home and at his ease ! 

The bullets used at the butts were huge leaden 
missiles, and copper caps were still in demand. 
Moreover, the cartridges were the same kind of 
greased cartridges that were one of the causes 
of the Indian Mutiny, and were enclosed in tough 
blue paper which required the use of a set of stout 
teeth before the powder could be poured from 
the paper case down the barrel of the gun. 
Sometimes grains of the gunpowder were left in 
the paper, which was rammed into the gun on 
the top of the powder, and as this said paper was 
then a hard pellet, dangerous accidents happened 
now and then. Indeed, the much-loved martinet 
of a colonel lost one of his eyes when riding down 
the line at a review in front of a company, volley- 
firing with blank cartridges ! All was not exactly 
play in the old days of the Volunteers ! 

Small boys used to hang about the butts at 
that time, for after a practice they could glean 
quite a harvest of lead and of the small copper 

215 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

caps, expanded into the shape of a tiny hat, 
after the rifles were fired off ! 

I should weary any one who was not a Volunteer 
by relating the different changes the rifle under- 
went before it came to its present perfection, 
but I have often wondered if any of the present- 
day crack shots could have done better than our 
men did in those bygone times. One of our best 
marksmen would not have been enrolled by the 
recruiting sergeant of to-day. True he had a 
splendid set of teeth and could snatch off the end 
of the cartridge with any one. But he was a tin- 
smith, and for some reason or other connected 
with his trade had worked at a lathe for most 
of his life. The consequence was that one leg 
was so much stronger than the other that he 
never could keep in step ; the lathe leg was 
always in front of the other, and he was in 
consequence a great trial to the whole company 
on a march. All the same he could shoot, and 
distinguished himself one day by killing a rook 
with a rifle on the wild heath that surrounded 
the butts; and he was, moreover, one of the 
largest, if not the largest, prize-winners among 
a set of men who might be No. 2 Company, but 
were second to none when it came to carrying off 
the prizes. I often used to go into Brett's shop 
and have a long talk to him about the Volunteers. 
And I cannot help thinking that nothing will ever 
come up to that splendid force. It brought 
masters and men together as nothing else will ; 
2x6 



DEFENDERS OF THEIR COUNTRY 

the prizes then were a secondary consideration ; 
the men paid for their own uniform ; the County 
helped with prizes and their own presence ; and 
there was not a single public occasion where the 
Volunteers were not well to the fore and one of 
the most prominent features of the day. The 
only drawback was the fact that it was distinctly 
expensive to be an officer, and that unless a man 
was well off he could not do all he would to keep 
his company together. At first, under the real 
dread of a Napoleonic invasion, men who could 
well afford the expense were eager to be officers, 
but as the years went on they fell away, and the 
officering of the company was left to those who 
really wanted their money for other things. 

Open confession being good for the soul, let 
me at once state that I never rested until my 
particular officer gave up his commission and 
retired into private life, and now I am extremely 
sorry that I was so very stupid. He was as a 
youth, only just of the proper age, one of the 
first men to join; he was an excellent shot, had 
passed at Hythe, had figured at the review in 
Hyde Park by the Queen in 1861, and had, more- 
over, gone over to Brussels and been feted at the 
Belgian Court with a few more fellow officers, 
and beside that had shot more than once for the 
Queen's Prize at Wimbledon, though he did not 
succeed in getting into the first hundred. 

Now in London one heard nothing but sneers 
at the Volunteers ; our beloved Punch took 

217 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

hilarious views of the movement ; the sight of a 
Volunteer in uniform going off to drill in his 
hardly-earned spare time meant jeers and gibes 
from cab and omnibus drivers and from small 
boys alike. Volunteers to me meant mockery. 
I could not see what they really were, but for 
several years I said nothing, albeit I thought 
much, until the captain of our company gave up ; 
there was no one except my special volunteer 
to take his place, and he then resigned. It was 
too expensive unless we spent less on ourselves. 
Now I should do so most willingly ; then I was 
rejoiced to think there would be no more calls 
on our purse, and no more smoking concerts and 
suppers, for appearing at which a special coat had 
to be kept. No after airing could remove the 
scent of the tobacco used, and as it was of a 
strong and appalling nature the coat itself had 
to live in a separate room until it was required 
for another similar occasion. 

I should much like to know why we one and 
all of us learn everything in life just too late to 
be of the smallest use, and, moreover, why what 
we have learned we can never pass on to any 
other person ? It appears a waste that should 
not be allowed in a world where they tell us 
nothing whatever ever is or can be wasted. I 
know this : there is not one single action of my 
life of any moment that, had I the chance, I 
should not do in an entirely different way to 
what I did, and this very Volunteer matter is 
218 



DEFENDERS OF THEIR COUNTRY 

one of those I really do deplore. For had I had 
the common sense to see what it meant I should 
have forgotten the jeers of Punch, and should 
have helped in every way I could to keep the 
company going and up to its very utmost strength. 
The only thing that I personally did enjoy was 
the yearly camp, the first one of which was 
greeted by an almost universal wail of despair 
from the wives and mothers of the men concerned. 
Open-air treatment was unknown in those days. 
Open windows were rare, and regarded with very 
great suspicion, and a person who dared to sleep 
with an open window would have been considered 
a lunatic, without the least doubt at all. What, 
what would happen, then, to those who, even in 
the height of summer, could be so rash as to 
contemplate spending a whole week under canvas, 
a mere tent being the only shelter provided 
between the men and the weather ? But it was 
a glorious experience, and a most perfect success. 
As if to encourage the men, that special week was 
one of splendid weather, and I do not remember 
hearing of one single contretemps. The camp 
itself was situated close to the sea, in a green 
valley between two hills, on one of the most ex- 
quisite parts of the southern coast, and we drove 
over more than once to see how the men were 
all getting on. My aunt was anxious about her 
somewhat elderly spouse, and we were all im- 
mensely excited at seeing the youths and men 
we knew so well in civil life gorgeous in their 

219 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

new uniform and trying hard to look as if they 
never under any circumstances could be anything 
save the soldiers they very well resembled in 
every single particular. It was curious, too, 
how the new life developed traits in individuals 
that otherwise would never have come to light. 
The stout little tailor who had made many of 
the uniforms, and whose taste and style in civi- 
lian garments was quite enough to make Beau 
Brummel arise from his dishonoured grave and 
curse aloud ; suddenly became a most admirable 
quartermaster ; no one knows to this day how 
he managed it, but never was a mess better 
suppUed and never were men better catered for 
than by this special man. Musicians, too, sprang 
to birth when a band was required. Buglers 
were found practising the calls at most unseemly 
hours and in most untoward places; and some 
months before the camp our malt-houses were 
requisitioned ; and there the band met and prac- 
tised until all within hearing devoutly wished 
either, that they were temporarily deaf, or that 
the band would disappear into space. I have 
often heard Thomas Hardy say that a great deal 
of the decadence of village Hfe is due to the 
fact that the old instrumental choirs have been 
aboHshed in favour of an organ and a surpliced 
choir ; and that the pleasure given to the men of 
the smallest villages by being allowed to play 
in these orchestras was enormous. Judging by 
the way our band used to practise, I can quite 

220 



DEFENDERS OF THEIR COUNTRY 

corroborate this statement, for not only were the 
bi-weekly practices carried out in the fullest 
manner, but individual members of the band 
practised at home, and one often heard weird 
wailing sounds proceeding after dark from the 
cottages in the town ; while one man even practised 
the bugle calls on a concertina, so that he should 
not be at a loss when he heard them in the field 
and had to obey them. 

The greatest day at the camp was a species of 
field-day, when the colonel brought some grand 
real soldier to the review, and proudly displayed 
to him his useful lot of men. No one nowadays 
would comprehend the excitement this day 
caused. The County folk came in their great 
carriages ; the townsfolk came in pony chariots, 
and the nondescript vehicles always known as 
" four- wheels " and " dog-traps " brought others ; 
while the farmers harnessed their best horses to 
their largest waggons, and brought in the wives 
and children of the men, whom they scarcely 
expected to find had survived the hardships of 
the terrible week spent out in the open and 
not under the thatch in the un ventilated, crowded 
bedrooms that were their usual share. The 
officers vied with each other in the arrangement 
and decoration of their tents, and those who had 
been at Wimbledon made small gardens in front 
of theirs, emulating those they had seen in that 
far-distant spot, while every place was tidied up 
and made to look spick and span indeed ! 

221 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

The officers, too, asked their friends to lunch 
in the mess-tent, and proud indeed were those 
among the townsfolk whose sons or husbands 
were in a position to invite them to share the 
meal with the most exclusive set in the most 
exclusive county in England. And though we 
did not go as far as did a neighbouring battalion 
and make all officers free to attend the County- 
ball as long as they remained officers, the privilege 
of the yearly luncheon in the great mess-tent 
was considered very great ; and I could smile 
were it not such a pathetic thing to recollect 
how much more the remains of the " County " 
desire to lunch nowadays with the despised 
outsider, than do the outsiders of that day ; 
now the very core and centre of the social life, 
such as it is, aspire to bid them share the over- 
filled tables at which they one and all sit down ! 

I wish I could describe the exquisite beauty 
of the splendid camp-fire which used to round up 
the eventful week, for it was a sight, once seen, 
that could never be forgotten. I was spending 
the whole day at the camp on the first occasion 
when I saw the fire, and had had many and 
varied experiences. First was the review, with 
its volley-firing and its to me incomprehensible 
manoeuvres ; then came the gorgeous lunch, 
and then a rest in the tent, where I and my sister- 
in-law sat on the bed, and though very tired were 
far too hilarious to rest. I should have thought 
we were making noise enough to be heard, but 

222 



DEFENDERS OF THEIR COUNTRY 

unfortunately we were not, as presently we 
heard the splashing of water, and, looking up, 
perceived that a couple of the officers were 
indulging in a bath just in front of the tent in 
the most unconcerned manner possible. As we 
could not move without their seeing us, we 
crouched down on the bed and hoped that we 
might escape without their being aware of our 
presence, and we managed, I am glad to say, to 
"He low," like Brer Rabbit; but whenever I was 
asked if I knew the gallant captain and his son 
I always replied, " No, I can't say I know them, 
although I may remark that at one time I saw a 
very great deal of them." If any one lives who re- 
collects this somewhat cryptic remark of mine they 
will now comprehend precisely what I meant by it. 
When we had had our tea and the dinner was 
over in the mess-tent, we were fetched to climb 
the hill from whence we should obtain the best 
view of the fire which the men were arranging 
and were about to set alight. We slipped and 
slid up and down the grass heavy with dew, and 
at last we reached the top. On the right hand 
lay the sea, already lighted by an August moon, 
and down in the hollow stood the serried rows 
of white tents, while round the great heap of 
faggots soon to burst into blaze ; scurried and ran 
the men, arranging seats, bringing up drinks, 
and all trying their best to arrange for the com- 
fort of their crowding visitors. Presently a bugle 
sounded ; four men thrust lighted torches into 

223 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

the brushwood, a round of cheers went up, and 
all settled down to the business of the night. 
The flames leaped higher and higher, the smoke 
blew away from the sea ; tiny atoms of lighted 
brushwood flew about and simulated fireflies. 
And then presently another bugle sounded ; all 
was quiet ; a tall, picturesque figure, clad in the 
dark grey uniform great- coat, came forward out 
of the mass, and a splendid tenor voice rose and 
sang until our eyes filled with tears, and I at 
least felt that thrill through me which one cannot 
describe, but that means an emotion so great that 
it is almost pain, but that I would not be without 
for anything in the wide world. That singer 
is long since dead. He was stone-deaf; he was 
one who was ever in the foremost movements of 
the time, an advanced Liberal, a wise, far-seeing 
man ; but I remember him, when all else have 
forgotten him, for his exquisite voice; and only 
once since have I ever heard any one sing as 
he did. That was at the Winchester Pageant. 
Doubtless that singer was well known to fame : I 
cannot say ; his name did not appear ; for me 
he will always remain a voice, as will the man who 
sang at the Lul worth camp in the 'sixties, when 
life and love were young and the world and all 
about us seemed to be indeed very good. 

A perceptible pause followed the song ; then 
an imperative encore. He sang again; the fire 
burned fiercely ; and presently my aunt remarked 
that it was late and extremely damp : oh, the 
224 



DEFENDERS OF THEIR COUNTRY 

horrid interruption ! She was bearing off my 
uncle; we were to go too. We clambered down 
into the valley ; the horses trotted slowly up 
the vast hill; and the last things we saw were 
the brushwood firefhes drifting up the valley ; 
the last things we heard a somewhat riotous 
comic song with a rousing chorus that followed 
us up the hill and almost reconciled us to the 
abrupt termination to our most delightful day. 
Nowadays camps are stern duty, severe discipline ; 
there are no camp-fires, no visitors, no splendid 
luncheons in vast and magnificent tents ; there 
is no playing at soldiers, and Volunteering has 
ceased to be. I have not the least doubt that 
the Territorial Army will be an army ; but I am 
also perfectly sure that it will never take the place 
of our Volunteers, when each camp was an epoch, 
the prize-shooting and prize-giving events of the 
greatest importance ; and when masters and men 
all ralHed round the drum, determined to with- 
stand any invader, and to keep their own country 
at any rate inviolate. The motto is now " Pro 
Patria " — that may mean anything ; my country 
— right or wrong — is an excellent sentiment ; 
all the same I like the old idea better, " Defence, 
not defiance," one's hearth and home. Citizen 
soldiers defend their city ; they need not go 
abroad and fight, justly or unjustly ; but should be 
reserved for home work, and that only. At least 
that is my opinion, and I give it for what it is 
worth, and that is most probably nothing at all. 
p 225 



CHAPTER IX 

FINDING THE GENERAL 

Some one has said that any one person's life 
holds material for a first-class novel. I hope 
there may be some truth in the remark, for it is 
impossible to make my life after I was married 
as generally entertaining as it undoubtedly 
was before that auspicious occasion. But forty 
years ago is as fresh in my mind as yesterday's 
doings, and I can recollect every single thing 
that happened as if it had only just occurred ; 
and I wish devoutly that some of the things at 
least could be forgotten. All the same I set out 
to tell the story, and having now reached the 
time when I joined the noble army of matrons 
let me continue it truthfully, and then, if neces- 
sary, for ever after hold my peace ; at least 
about myself. I do not think any one was ever 
so miserable in the whole world as I was when 
I had been married about a couple of years and 
understood what I had let myself in for. As 
long as I could get about with my husband and 
we were left alone things were right enough, 
226 



FINDING THE GENERAL 

but when I had become a mother my life was 
one long nightmare ; and I honestly confess I 
never left the house without expecting to find 
one of the children had died in my absence, or 
met with some fearful accident that would be 
almost as bad as death itself. In those days, 
too, a brewer in the country had to work as few 
men work in these degenerate days ; and though 
my husband was supposed only to attend to one 
half the work, the whole fell on his shoulders. 
His brother was not fond of work at any time, 
and left all to the one, who from those days to 
these has done more hard, real work than any 
one else in his position ever did; of that I am 
quite sure. I have known him rise at six, and 
be in and about the brewery until a quarter to 
ten at night, of course coming in for a short time 
at meals ; and we have often had our Sunday- 
night supper interrupted by the engineer, waiting 
for orders at the dining-room door while supper 
went on, and the orders for his night work were 
accurately laid down for him during the meal. 
There were no half-holidays then on a Saturday 
for either masters or men, and no early closing ; 
we have often had our dinner at ten instead of 
the then orthodox hour of seven. Luncheon 
might come off, or it might not ; while breakfast, 
nominally at eight-thirty, might be then or at 
any hour : all depended on the letters of the 
day : what "orders " there were, and where the 
carters had to be sent. Sometimes in a hurry 

227 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

to some out-of-the-way public-house on a most 
detestable road. At first I used to watch for 
the departure of our foreman down the lane, 
which was the signal that the men had all departed, 
and that only my husband was left in the office 
to finish the day's work, while sometimes his 
brother and the engineer were up in the brewing 
house watching the development of some pet 
mash. I can see Gould now, a tall, slouching 
figure of a man, as he slunk down past my 
window, the keys of the great gates in his hand, 
and being met by some of his very numerous 
boys and girls. Then I used to go into the 
office and " post the ledgers " ; and if those old 
books are still in existence they contain columns 
and columns of figures which would speak for 
themselves of the share I had in the day's work. 
I knew nothing of book-keeping and business, 
but I soon learned, and I am convinced that if I 
had been allowed to continue the work : as most 
Frenchwomen are whose husbands are in business : 
I should have developed really fine business 
capacities, and, moreover, an understanding of 
what money means and what it can do that 
would have been more invaluable than I can say. 
But unfortunately my brother-in-law had a wife, 
and between her and myself a regular feud raged ; 
or rather on my side the feud took the foolish 
form of ignoring a personality that was inimical 
to me ; on her side it was raging always, and I 
cannot blame her in that it did. Had I had the 
228 



FINDING THE GENERAL 

wisdom of my present years there would have 
been no feud at all ; we should have been 
respectful acquaintances instead of foolish, quar- 
relling, female idiots ! When she found I was 
helping my husband, she of course must help her 
own ; there was not room for the two of us, and 
I gave up the books and retired from the work, 
which I had learned by that time to love. I am 
no advocate for women's rights, but I do think 
that a woman has a right to help her husband. 
Our office was reached through our garden, and 
a sentimental fancy makes me still keep the 
office key, although the lock is long since changed. 
My evenings were never dull when I could slip 
in there and take my part in the work; they 
became appalling simply, when I could no longer 
do it. Then I began to look round for something 
to do. I could not sew or draw ; I had not then 
taken to writing ; and though I scribbled extremely 
long letters to my sisters, which I devoutly wish 
they had kept, for they used to assure me they 
were quite as amusing as novels; I could not 
write all the evening. Books and papers were 
scarce, no one ever " came in " in the good old 
Pembridge Villas way, and I have often and 
often gone down to what we called the " lower 
garden," and, watching the river from my pet 
seat under the privet-hedge ; wondered if I should 
not be wise to slip in "by accident," and so put 
an end to an existence that began to bore me 
more frightfully than I can say. I used to think 

329 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

of our hilarious parties ; of the roll of the traffic, 
like the sound of the sea on the distant shore 
away across the hills ; of the theatres and parties 
I once despised; and I thought of how my life 
was slipping away, age approaching: I was 
twenty-four: and nothing to do, nothing to 
hear or see, save the eternal gossip of the towns- 
folk and the countryside, which I had not then 
learned how to appreciate as I now do, when it is 
once more out of my reach. Life was teaching 
me lessons then that I recognise now, but that 
then I would not learn, and I was almost deter- 
mined to cast off every tie of love and duty that 
I had, when rescue came to me in the somewhat 
foolish form of private theatricals. 

But such theatricals ! I had, of course, done 
the usual Ici on parte Franpais and The Area 
Belle and other trifles at home, and our " dumb 
crambo" and " charades " were features at our 
Christmas parties, but i had never taken part in 
a real play, and here was I offered the leading 
lady's rdle in New Men and Old Acres by my 
dearest North Street friend, and really was 
considered good enough to take on one of Ellen 
Terry's familiar parts. Life sparkled once more 
and became full of life ; my aunt and other 
married ladies in the town were constrained to 
" deal with me faithfully," but he who in a long, 
hard life has never once failed me, spoke out and 
told me to go on : it was just what I ought to 
do. So without the slightest quake then I made 
330 



FINDING THE GENERAL 

my debut on the boards ; and after nearly forty 
years I think I may say I did so with the most 
unquaUfied success, and began an amusement 
that never failed me until I left the town alto- 
gether, and went where such means of passing 
the time were no longer necessary. The staging 
of New Men and Old Acres was made memorable 
inasmuch that we had Kegan Paul as our 
prompter, and among the audience of the first 
night was Dr. Allman, then of Parkstone, the 
great botanist, and Sir Joseph Hooker, of Kew. 
Moreover, the whole of the scenery and the stage 
were made and arranged in the North Street 
house, and looked like fairyland, while our 
success was so great that we were asked to repeat 
it for a charity, and we filled the new Corn Ex- 
change to repletion and sent a substantial sum 
of money to the county hospital. Moreover, 
one of our actors was the present Sir William 
Allchin, and he made one of the hilarious band 
who, the next day, went out into the heath 
beyond the town and was present at the solemn 
and most delightful ceremony of finding the 
General. Unfortunately, on the night of the 
last rehearsal we could not light the stage in a 
satisfactory manner, and we suspended all the 
carriage lamps we could find, on the back of the 
proscenium or else on one of the wings. I was 
leaning forward looking at the stage with my 
hand on Mr. Kegan Paul's shoulder, when bang, 
crash came down one of the lamps on his head. 

231 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

I caught the lamp fortunately before it could set 
fire to anything, but seeing gore begin to flow 
I fled and sent Dr. Allchin to bind up the wound, 
that deprived us of our prompter for the time, 
and prevented him from being one of the party 
that went to look for the General. Not that 
we set out to find any one so illustrious, but we 
were about to open a barrow which had never 
been touched since the time when Romans and 
Britons fought across the heath; and the con- 
quering Romans built their villas there ; later on 
leaving them to fall to pieces; with only huge 
mounds to show v/here the slain were laid. I am 
not at all sure that I like being present when these 
secret places are laid bare, but most certainly 
that occasion was a very thrilling one. When 
we arrived at the barrow we found that the top 
had been removed under the instructions of the 
Master and Sir Joseph Hooker, and that they 
were waiting for us to dig deeper. Already we 
found tiny glass beads and some queerly shaped 
pieces of bone, and we began to feel eerie. The 
men advanced, and under directions began to dig, 
or rather scratch away, the soil. They were 
stopped by a signal from the Master, and presently 
Sir Joseph, Dr. Allman, and the Master went down 
on their knees, and literally dug with their hands, 
gradually getting out a perfect urn; quite an 
enormous one, of baked earth or clay, with an 
indented pattern all round the edge and covering 
the sides, which they inspected with the greatest 
232 



FINDING THE GENERAL 

awe and reverence, and proclaimed with one 
voice that there was no such specimen of urn- 
burial even in the British Museum itself ! The 
urn was pronounced to hold the calcined bones 
of some great general, and one of the authorities 
declared that this fact would be proved by the 
finding of other smaller urns, north, south, east, 
and west of the General. So the digging began 
once more, and north of the bigger urn was 
discovered a very much smaller and equally 
perfect urn ; but this was put back : there were 
similar urns already in the Museum; and I 
honestly was glad when the funeral rites were 
over, and, minus " the General," the barrow was 
restored as much as possible to its pristine state. 
There were no papers then to send down corre- 
spondents, and none save ourselves knew about 
the opening of the barrow, but I often look towards 
it and recollect the hilarious day we spent once 
the digging was over and we could settle down 
to what was then the most amusing part, namely, 
the open-air picnic, and the riotous dance to our 
own sweet voices, undeterred by the fact that 
every time we crossed and recrossed in the 
lancers and quadrilles we had to leap a ditch. 
The spectacle of the Master, Sir Joseph, and Dr. 
Allman leaping this ditch was a sight for gods 
and men, and added considerably to the joy of 
the successful and delightful day. I am not 
sure if it were on that occasion or if it were later 
on that we showed the scientists the moon wort 

233 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

fern, the great Cornish heath, the blue gentian, 
and above all the cruel fly-eating sundew, that 
appears so innocent and yet is such a murderous 
creature, but I do know that the Osmunda regalis 
was one of the prizes of that special day ; and 
that Dr. Allman took up some vast roots to plant 
in his garden, where he had a perfect collection 
of all sorts and kinds of water plants and ferns. 

Now comes the tragedy of the General, made 
even more tragic by the fact that the Master had 
taken us over the site of the Roman villa which 
might have seen the battle in which the General 
fell ; and had told of the elaborate pavement and 
pillars he had found, only to allow them to be 
covered in again. All except one pillar which 
stood in his conservatory and which is reproduced 
opposite, and on which later on the General 
himself was placed to be photographed in the very 
unsatisfactory manner of those days. When we 
had conveyed the precious urn back to the house 
and the photograph was safely accomplished, the 
Master looked about for the least dangerous place 
in which to keep the General until the next day, 
when the scientists were to take it up to the 
British Museum, and to obtain the exact date 
and age of the urn. We had had just one glimpse 
at the contents, which appeared to me to consist 
of calcined bones, enwrapped in a species of cere- 
cloth, for I think the top of the urn had been 
removed by unsealing it, by Sir Joseph Hooker's 
careful hands. Anyhow, I know we all gazed 
234 





PILLAR FROM ROMAN VILLA. 



FINDING THE GENERAL 

with awe as he unrolled the cloth and let the 
bits of bone appear, and I was glad when he 
closed it down and fastened it securely ; and we 
one and all most flatly refused to spend the night 
with the urn in our rooms. Even the Master 
could not prevail on his wife to have it on her 
dressing-table, and we were at our wits' end. 

To the best of my recollection the scientific 
men were staying at the local inn, and as they 
were dining in North Street would have to leave 
it alone for some hours at least. In North Street 
there were eight or nine remarkably curious 
infants, ranging from eight or nine upwards. 
What was to be done ? Finally the Master 
recollected an ancient clock that had stood on a 
bracket in the hall for more years than he could 
recollect. It was only reached by the green- 
house ladder, used once a week to wind the clock. 
With many groans the clock was removed, the 
bracket carefully tested and dusted, and then 
with great ceremony Sir Joseph ascended the 
ladder and, placing the General there, came down, 
and we all sighed with relief, ate a large and 
excellent dinner, kissed our hands to the General 
and went on our respective ways rejoicing. In 
the middle of the night the Master and his wife 
were aroused from sleep ; she said by a series of 
awful groans, he said by one tremendous crash : 
They both jumped out of bed. Still neither 
thought of the General. But after ascertaining 
that the house had not fallen, and that all the 

235 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

children were in bed and asleep, the Master 
proceeded downstairs. There in the hall lay 
the General, smashed to pieces, while the bracket 
remained in its place, and apparently was looking 
with scorn at the burden it had cast off. How 
the General fell from his perch was never ascer- 
tained ; we of course liked to believe that his 
haughty spirit had returned to earth and resented 
the fact that his remains were exposed to view, 
but I fear that neither of the baulked scientists 
took this side of the question. They were heard 
to suggest boys and long poles, though as the 
boys were found fast asleep in their beds I really 
don't think they had anything whatever to do 
with the matter. The remains of the General 
were gathered together, the urn was patched 
together as well as it could be, and I think Sir 
Joseph took that away, but we solemnly conveyed 
the horrid bones and the cere-cloths back to the 
barrow and buried them there, where they had 
lain so long undisturbed. I cannot say I like 
these human remains dug up and dealt with ; 
after all they once were human, and were most 
undoubtedly of like fashion with ourselves ! I 
once saw the skeletons of four Roman soldiers 
discovered ; they were at Max Gate, where 
Thomas Hardy now lives, and where he was then 
building his house ; and a very uncanny sight 
it was. They lay out gaunt and straight in a 
white chalk grave. For two thousand years they 
had slept there out of sight, with urns at their 
feet, and golden rings and fibulae, now in the 
236 



FINDING THE GENERAL 

Dorchester Museum, and some in Mr. Hardy's 
own house. But I should not care to have these 
things myself. They must have become sentient 
in the two thousand years they lay hid among 
the bones of the soldiers, and I should expect 
them to talk together o' nights, even if the spirits 
of the original owners did not stalk out of the 
darkness and come and claim them for their own. 
From the date of the finding of the General 
life for me at any rate took on a far more hilarious 
guise. Kegan Paul was then living within access 
of us, and he often came over to luncheon and 
had long talks with us all. He then had pupils 
in his quiet rectory. One of these held the title 
of a Spanish duke, and he endeavoured to live 
up to it. He looked undoubtedly as a Spaniard 
should, and as he wore a large slouch hat and a 
cloak, the end of which he cast over one shoulder 
when he strolled about investigating the town, 
he created quite a sensation, and I was very sorry 
when, his education being finished, he went away 
to join his mother in France. She was an English 
countess, and I suppose our romantic youthful 
friend was the son of an earlier marriage ; yet 
they were a weird couple. She believed she was 
the reincarnation of Mary Queen of Scots, and 
mother and son were both strong spiritualists. 
She is long since dead, and as I have not heard 
of him for many years I expect he is dead too. 
However, I have never forgotten our strolls 
across the windy Causeway, he trying in vain to 
keep his hat and cloak in order, and I trying 

237 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

equally vigorously to talk to him and ignore the 
presence of sundry small boys and girls at our 
heels, who were following him and trying to 
make out what his most extraordinary costume 

meant. While I took the Due de P for a 

walk Kegan Paul was planning further diversions 
for us ; he it was who suggested we should have 
regular readings of Shakespeare's plays or evenings 
from the different poets, and though he most 
certainly never came over for these occasions, 
we had most hilarious gatherings. Whether we 
any of us knew more about Shakespeare than 
we did before they began I cannot say; anyhow 
these readings brought us all together and gave 
us something to look forward to from week to 
week. Any one who knows the town now would 
never credit for one instant that such gatherings 
were possible, but then there were at least ten 
separate houses where they could be held, and 
we went from house to house until the winter 
was over and we could turn our minds to out- 
door sports. The food was restricted to sand- 
wiches, cake, and mulled claret, so that there 
should be no rivalry in the entertainment, and 
only one of us broke the rule ; but as the offender 
was a bachelor and gave us the most excellent 
sparkling Moselle and tongue sandwiches he was 
forgiven. His entertainment was the best of all ; 
for it is a curious fact that when a bachelor does 
entertain " on his own " he does it better than 
any one else in the wide world. 
238 



FINDING THE GENERAL 

If our dear friend at the bank gave the best 
entertainment, my aunt succeeded in giving the 
most hilarious one, albeit she did not mean it 
to be so by any means. The play was Hamlet, 
and my eldest cousin; one of the very best 
amateur actors who ever existed ; was cast for the 
title role ; and while all the rest of us were begged 
to leave out as much of our parts as we could, 
while my aunt kept an eye on the clock, Hamlet 
was unabridged, and I question if we should ever 
have finished, had not the ghost had a slight 
quarrel with Polonius, who had burst into shrieks 
of laughter at the deep ghostly tone of voice in 
which Hamlet's father read his part. Then a 
further interruption was caused by the arrival 
of the bedroom candlesticks on a tray as the 
clock struck ten, when my uncle woke from his 
slumber in his deep armchair, rubbed the back 
of his head, and gazed around. Then he said : 
*' Here still ! Why, I thought it was to-morrow 
morning," on which remarkably broad hint the 
party broke up. None of us had read much of 
our parts, and though we were invited to com- 
plete Hamlet the following week, we preferred to 
continue the regular round, and from that day 
to this we never finished the melancholy Dane's 
story. 

In the year 1873 we had several most amusing 
excursions, and one in particular was to see the 
Devastation, one of the first big armoured ships, 
which was then in Portland, and which we looked 

239 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

all over with great joy and pride. I have not 
the least doubt that it would appear quite an 
infant beside the Devastations of the present day, 
but the size appeared to us enormous, and we 
were to see it again under very terrifying cir- 
cumstances a little later on in the year. 

The Shah of Persia had arrived in England, 
and a great review was to be held in his honour 
at Spithead, and our adventurous friend the 
Master determined that we should one and all be 
present and see the review for ourselves. The 
Master never had the least idea of danger, and 
fear was a feeling he could not comprehend at all, 
and as we knew him thoroughly we had no arriere 
pensee when we consented to make one of his 
party. It was the 23rd of June, and we arranged 
to meet on the quay at 4.30 a.m. and start out on 
our perilous adventure. The Master possessed a 
small swift steamer which he used to tug his clay- 
vessels down to the bigger town, whence the clay 
they contained could be put into larger vessels 
and so be taken on to its destination in Stafford- 
shire, and it was this steamer, cleaned, swept, and 
garnished, in which we were to adventure forth ! 
It was a most exquisite day, a perfect June 
morning, and we were one and all only half 
awake, yet still we were true to time, and only 
waited for the Master. Presently he came 
sauntering along towards us in his slippers and 
without his coat, and just as the town clock 
struck five the housemaid was seen flying over 
240 



FINDING THE GENERAL 

the bridge ; in one hand she bore his coat, in 
the other his boots ; and as we gUded away from 
the quay he finished his toilet, while we looked 
and laughed at him and wondered what he 
would do next. There are now only three 
survivors of that happy company; all the rest 
are dead; and I much wonder if the one living 
beside ourselves recollects the agonised sufferings 
we endured during the day ! All went well as 
long as we were not in the open sea ; the Master, 
and indeed most of us, knew the intricate channel 
that leads to the wide harbour and then out to 
sea as well as we knew the town ; but the open 
sea meant something quite different. To me 
at least until that fearsome day, the sea was the 
sea and nothing else ; and it was only when I saw 
Sturmey steering by a chart, and heard him and 
the Master conduct an animated dispute as to 
the whereabouts of sundry shoals and pitfalls, 
that I realised that sailing is not always plain 
sailing, and that it requires knowledge to steer 
a toy steamer, even in the Solent. Anyhow, we 
arrived at Spithead, and here more troubles 
awaited us ; gigantic excursion steamers appeared 
ready to crush the life out of us, and presently 
we came to a stop close under the great Devasta- 
tion herself, meaning to see the Royal yacht from 
under her stern. But the instant the Royal 
yacht was in sight the great guns above us 
belched out smoke and flame. The boards 
under our feet appeared to start apart ; we could 
241 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

not see each other, let alone the coming Shah, 
we could not hear a sound, and I for one sat 
in the most abject terror of what must come 
next when suddenly the Master gave an order ; 
we crept out from our shelter, and just as the 
Royal yacht came gliding by he dashed after her, 
and we went up and down between the lines of 
the ships as if we were the Royal yacht, pursued 
presently by a smaller steam pinnace bearing 
Prince Edward of Saxe- Weimar, whose language 
was so emphatic that we heard it despite the guns. 
But the Master took no notice, steamed on, 
passed the Royal yacht, where we saw the Shah 
well, and then he turned, bolted under the bows 
of another enormous ship, and made straight for 
the shelter of the neighbouring Isle of Wight. 
I never in all my life experienced such a fearful 
day of fright, and when we were landed, I think 
at Yarmouth, to obtain some provisions for the 
return journey I swore that nothing would get 
me on the steamer again. However, the worst 
of the danger was over ; it began to blow a 
little; the Master wanted to return quickly, as 
the Channel up the river at night was rather 
difficult to negotiate. We left three or four 
sea-sick victims who had, I think, to sleep on 
the pier, so crowded was the island for the review, 
and off we set, getting home about 2.30 a.m., 
for the night turned out a " nasty " one. One 
of our celebrated south-westerly winds and mists 
was about; we had literally to feel our way up 
243 



FINDING THE GENERAL 

the river, every one on board advising the Master 
as he steered to take a different course; but he 
smiled and said nothing. All the same I think 
he was as glad as we were when he landed his 
cold and dripping crew at the quay, when we 
rushed home to find our old nurse almost in 
hysterics. She expected us home long before 
we arrived, and had, of course, come to the con- 
clusion that we had one and all found a watery 
grave. 

One more excursion we had on the steamer, 
and that was round to Swanage to see the launch 
of the first lifeboat that was ever placed there, 
and then I really did expect to be swamped. 
When we came out of the harbour into the sea 
we found half a gale blowing, and we suggested 
that we should be quite happy to return home. 
But the Master laughed our fears to scorn, told 
the males of the party to see we were not washed 
overboard, and after tying the stout and faithful 
cook to the funnel he proceeded on his way. I 
personally loved that voyage. Coward as I am, 
I am not afraid of the open sea, and I shall never 
forget how we raced up and down the waves, 
while the cook, reduced to the last stage of 
misery by sea-sickness and fright, allowed herself 
to be washed to and fro on the deck without 
putting out a hand to save herself, while her 
ample form in its crinoletted petticoats swayed 
hither and thither until I began to think the 
poor creature must be dead. Indeed, the life- 

243 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

boat crew thought we were to be the first people 
they should have the honour of rescuing, and 
got ready to come out to us, when we managed 
to get into the bay and up to the little wooden 
pier, where we disembarked. The steamer re- 
turned by itself as far as the guests were concerned ; 
we hired a carriage of a primitive kind and drove 
home, and I for one never attempted another 
steamer trip as long as I remained in the neigh- 
bourhood. 

I cannot quite recollect when the ultra- 
detestable institution of Bank Holidays began, 
but judging from my diaries I should think it 
was about 1874. There were holidays at the 
bank before then, but they were only four, and 
our principal holidays were Whit-Monday and 
the Queen's Accession, called Ascension Day by 
the townsfolk, who never recognised any other 
time as worthy of that name, and on both these 
occasions the different clubs used to walk. I 
recollect the Foresters principally because they 
wore such weird and remarkable clothes and 
because they always carried the most enormous 
banners and emblems into church, and because 
some of them were mounted on quite old cart- 
horses, and wore green tunics and hats with 
feathers in them. Those who walked did so in 
couples, each man's little finger entwined with 
the Uttle finger of his companion, while the 
whole town looked on and made holiday. The 
church bells rang frantically and brass bands 
244 



FINDING THE GENERAL 

played loudly, and a vast feast was held in a tent, 
where speeches were made, to which ladies were 
not admitted. They came in to tea and joined 
in a wild dance in the field, and all went as merry 
as a marriage bell. I find in my diary for 1874 
the remark on the August Bank Holiday, 
" Disgusting day ; general holiday ; most people 
drunk " ; a remark not to be found either before 
or since. Certainly I never saw any drunkenness 
after the club walking, any more than one sees 
it now ! I know we were very sorry when the 
"club walking" ceased, and for some years I 
wondered what had become of the enormous 
" open hand " and the weird banners that were 
carried. I saw the banners or their fellows at 
more than one demonstration during the present 
year, but the great gold hand on a pole that 
used to be the most prominent feature in church 
while the service was going on has disappeared, 
at least as far as I am concerned. 

When our club walking and our summer 
excursions were over we began to seriously look 
forward to the winter. We had had enough of 
Shakespeare, and we each settled to choose a 
poet, and I, with a trifle more swagger than was 
prudent, selected Browning. Will it be beUeved 
that my copy, given me by Shirley Brooks on 
my wedding day, in four neat blue volumes, 
was the only one in the town, and that more 
than one of our most enlightened friends had 
never heard of the poet ? They had heard of 

245 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

his wife, so selections from her poems being 
accessible we decided on her, and had no doubt 
a far more entertaining evening than we other- 
wise should. Then came the still more important 
subject of choosing our Christmas play, and will 
it be believed that our manageress selected The 
Rivals? In vain I begged for Caste; our mana- 
geress was a great believer in costume plays ; and 
I was given " Lydia Languish," and immediately 
was plunged into the utmost gloom and despair. 

In October 1873 I went to London, and had 
the good fortune to meet my dearly loved god- 
father, Mr. E. M. Ward, the Academician, and he 
somewhat raised my drooping spirits. Mr. Ward 
was without exception the dearest and kindest 
of men, although he once deeply hurt me by 
telling me that as I was born in October the 
only flowers I could have for my birthday wreath 
and crown were dahlias, and that in consequence 
earwigs would walk all over my cake. All the 
same he gave me my first wax doll. Alas ! her 
career was a short one ; my sister sat down on 
her waxen countenance and reduced her to pieces, 
a crime I have never forgotten, though it happened 
much more than fifty years ago. 

And once more my godfather came to my aid ; 
cheered me up much about " Lydia," and sent 
me the sketch for her dress reproduced here, 
which speaks for itself. Unfortunately I was 
not able to wear it ; my father-in-law died ; 
the theatricals came off without me ; and we put 
246 



C>1^ /Ct^tt^ ^ii^A^t^^y^LyCf^ 



(ht^^ ^--^^ v^^ 







^^A'iZl 'TVtAA^^^ aC^Lc^ UaJ^ ^^!tL^ aeux) 



^^k, ^uu^i.,^ l^?^v^X^/i^*^'^^^ -^.^^^ 



LYDIA LANGUISH. 



FINDING THE GENERAL 

the first flowers ever seen at a local funeral on 
his coffin, emblems in moss and violets to betoken 
that he was a freemason, and a cross to show 
the faith he had held strenuously through a 
somewhat extraordinary career. But he was 
of an age that took its religion on a Sunday 
only, when he made himself and others very 
uncomfortable for the day ; and quite forgot the 
obligations of his special form during the week, 
as was the custom in those long since dead days 
of one's youth. 

The visit to the Wards should have a few more 
words, I think, for they were then living at 
Windsor, and we had revisited all our old haunts 
of 1863 and 1864, when we lived there for some 
months when my father was painting the marriage 
of the then Prince of Wales — " Uncle Wales' 
wedding," as that enfant terrible the German 
Emperor called the picture. But all was the 
same in the Castle ; the same hideous carpets, 
and green and crimson damask-hung walls in 
the awful corridors ; and the dreadful gloom still 
hung about Queen Victoria's private rooms, and 
we were glad to get away from it down the beau- 
tiful Long Walk to the Wards' house. It was the 
last time I saw my godfather, his handsome wife 
and splendid family. Many of the beautiful girls 
and boys are dead and gone ; but I do not think 
I ever saw such a good-looking family, and I wish 
some day that we might all meet again ! 

We were naturally quiet for a few weeks after 

247 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

my father-in-law was buried, but the town was 
soon plunged into warfare over the formation of 
its first Local Board. How amusing it is to 
recollect how we raged and fumed over its 
personality, how we fought for reform and did 
not get it, and how we burned with passion when 
the reactionary party came in in full force, and 
we were one and all beaten on the subject of 
proper drainage, a good water-supply, baths 
and wash-houses, and the hundred and one things 
we deemed necessary to social salvation! 

To obtain money for some of these schemes 
we got up a bazaar. Papa sent me down the 
sketch of " Pamela," which sold for £12 12^., and 
took him, I expect, about as many minutes to do. 
But all was in vain : y\^e were beaten, and the 
party of "no progress " came in in triumph, as 
I remarked before, and things remained in the 
bad old state until long after we had left the 
town. 

But 1874 was a bad year for me. My dearest 
friend died of typhoid fever in October and 
when my second son was born in December, my 
dear old nurse died after a few hours' illness, and 
life seemed so black that it really never became 
quite as joyous again ! She was in my room 
at twelve, and I told her I had seen in the looking- 
glass the temporary nurse drinking brandy out 
of the bottle. She said she would take care it 
did not happen again. At six she was dead, 
her last act being to put out her hand to prevent 
248 







-A- 



PAMELA. 



FINDING THE GENERAL 

the cot in which one of the children slept to be 
moved. Her first and last idea was duty, and 
she died : oh, gallant soul ! as she had lived, 
in harness. 

Just a few words about her before I close this 
chapter and go on to more of our country life. 
She had been married, but as she always said 
" Men were a pore lot," I fancy her venture had 
been a bad one. She had never had a husband 
in all the years I had known her ; and she could 
not have had any calls on her purse, for when 
our lawyer came at my request to take over 
her belongings, and separate them from mine : he 
found nearly one hundred pounds in bank-notes 
in her cupboard. The first one bearing a date that 
denoted she was given it at my eldest brother's 
birth : so long ago that had it been put out to 
interest, it would have doubled itself before it 
was found among her dresses, sixteen of which, 
of all sorts and patterns, were in her cupboards 
among an accumulation of odds and ends that 
was simply astonishing. To complete the story 
of dear Nan. She was to appear to me once again 
in my dreams on the night of the 10th of June, 1875, 
when I certainly had a most extraordinary dream, 
or I should say series of dreams. I dreamed that 
all that night Nan was stretching her skeleton 
hands out of the grave and was trying to drag 
one of us in. The whole ten of us were standing 
round her grave, and I could see her as well as 
if it were daylight. Three times I awoke in 

249 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

horror and told my husband ; manlike, he re- 
marked, " Gk) to sleep and don't talk nonsense." 
But my dream obsessed me. I told it to my 
nursery governess at breakfast, and to some 
friends I had to dinner. Next morning I had a 
letter to say Willie was dead, had been dying all 
that night, and they had not wired, as they 
should have done, to let me know. Of course 
the town believed I had concealed the fact of 
his death so that my dinner-party need not be 
given up. No one save the dear old nurse from 
her grave had warned me, and my brother 
had been dead twenty-four hours before I knew 
that he was even ill. Peace to his memory. 
He was only twenty-six, and was just beginning 
to do well. Perhaps the finding of the General 
meant more than appeared at first sight, for 
truly since the day we violated his tomb ill-luck 
has dogged our footsteps, which, considering it 
was the Master who dug him up and we only 
looked on, seems a trifle unfair. All the same 
I think he has had something to do with the 
many unhappy things which have now and again 
somewhat spoiled our lives. 



250 



CHAPTER X 

** COME OUT : 'TIS NOW SEPTEMBER ! " 

When we were first married, and, indeed, for 
some years after, September was our season, our 
month of months. It is curious to look back 
through the volumes of diaries I still keep by me, 
and notice that for one solid fortnight we dined 
out or had people to dinner every single night; 
and I recollect with a shudder all I endured 
when it was my turn to be hostess, and my 
special dinner-party was on my mind ; really 
from one year to the other. 

It is easy enough now to entertain in the 
country, and besides that I bought my experience 
remarkably dearly, and am in consequence much 
more able to cope with the housekeeping than I 
was then. Indeed, I remember with pride that 
when some little time ago I was hving for a while 
at least eight miles from a shop Mr. Barry Pain, 
who was staying with me, remarked that he 
could not understand where the food came from. 
Nothing was ever forgotten, and we had always 
a sufficiently varied menu to please even his 

251 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

fastidious taste ! But early in the 'seventies 

housekeeping was a real toil in a country town, 

where fish was quite unobtainable unless we 

caught an occasional salmon, or a, to me, horrible 

jack ; when one's cook was not sufficiently skilled 

to manage a '' party " soup, and where nothing 

out of the way could either be made or bought. 

Bought ! The housekeepers of that day would 

have had fits had they known what I did buy. 

But when I married I was absolutely ignorant 

of housekeeping in every shape or form, and 

though I knew what we used to have at home 

for a dinner-party I had not the smallest idea 

how it was made. So I invariably sent to 

Southampton for my soup and fish and for any 

extra- superior sweet with which I hoped to cut 

out the giver of the last extensive party. Papa 

was accustomed to come down then to us for 

ten days for the shooting, and he was the hero 

and guest of the occasion. My aunt was extremely 

proud of her distinguished brother-in-law, but 

though he was received at Court and was known 

all over theworld at that time as a most celebrated 

and popular artist, I cannot recollect his existence 

was ever recognised by the " County." At least 

he was never asked to shoot by those whose very 

names now are well-nigh forgotten, and their 

places filled by a succession of tenants who are 

here to-day, as is the saying, and gone on their 

way to-morrow. But despite that fact, he had 

sport enough all round, and we used to have the 

252 



"COME OUT: 'TIS NOW SEPTEMBER!" 

greatest possible fun; and if my special share 
was rather spoiled by the preparations for divers 
luncheon and dinner-parties, once I was sure 
that my food was sent off and that all was in 
train I was quite as excited about the sport to 
be obtained as any one of the men-folk were. 

I have, I must confess, suffered real agonies 
about the supplies. The trains were few, and if 
my fish and soup did not come by one train, the 
next one was so late that failure loomed before 
us ; and I have spent moments of anguish hang- 
ing out of the schoolroom window, gazing out for 
the omnibus which was to bring my basket. It 
sounds absurd, does it not ? But what would my 
dinner-party have been minus fish, soup, oysters, 
ices, dessert, and often enough an elaborate 
arrangement of cream and jelly as well ? If 
present-day housekeepers have nothing else to be 
thankful for they can be most deeply grateful 
for the manner in which they have been made 
independent of bad cooks, and, indeed, of cooks 
at all, by the divers prepared dishes that only 
require reheating to make a decent meal. But 
in my time it was really hard work to housekeep 
even quietly, and in many a house a dinner- 
party meant at least three days of preparation, 
one day of agonised performance, and yet a 
fourth of putting away and cleaning and dusting 
and fussing that was truly terrible for all concerned 
in the affair. 

What I mean can be best explained by 

253 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

describing one of the shooting parties that I think 
Papa enjoyed almost the best of all, simply 
because it was so unlike anything he ever met 
with in his London life, but which carried him 
back in a measure to some of the bygone days 
of his early youth. Before he became a popular 
and well-known artist he used to go from house 
to house in Yorkshire and Lincolnshire painting 
portraits, and as most of his clientele were large 
yeoman farmers or small squires, he had oppor- 
tunities of learning to shoot of which he availed 
himself when he possibly could. He used to 
tell us when we were children about these visits 
and describe with great gusto the enormous 
breakfasts he ate, and how, if it were a particularly 
fine day, the subject of the portrait would fidget 
and finally perceive that it was much too good 
a day to waste over paint, and how they would 
make off with the dogs, great hunks of bread 
and cheese in their pockets, and struggle through 
turnips and over ploughed fields until it was dark, 
returning to a vast meal of roast meat and 
pudding, the pudding often enough preceding 
the meat. Then a glass of port wine, a smoke 
and grog would go round, and finally the shooters 
would fall asleep over the fire, being roused at 
the awful hour of ten by the lady of the house, 
anxious for the " maiden " to clear the table 
and retire to rest; and doubly anxious lest the 
candles should fall unsnuffed on the table and 
set the whole of the house on fire. Indeed, 
254 



"COME OUT: 'TIS NOW SEPTEMBER!" 

often enough the picture was forgotten, for all 
shooting then was a very serious matter as regards 
the preparation of the ammunition, &c., and a 
return visit would have to take place when the 
shooting was over, for neither Papa nor his 
country hosts could ever refuse a day's sport. I 
believe from what he has told us and from what I 
know of him too that Papa was considered a most 
dangerous visitor by the females of the house. 
The daughters were almost always solemnly 
warned against his attractions and were told how 
low and fearsome was the status of an artist; 
and, moreover, London was drawn in such lurid 
colours that no girl who was not utterly defiant 
of the tender sensibilities of the times would ever 
contemplate without a shudder the idea of living 
in such an atmosphere of crime and sin and dirt. 
Oh, dear, good old times ! — now getting on for 
seventy years ago — how glad am I that I did 
not live then ! How still gladder should I be were 
I to be born now and be able to look forward to 
all that the new century must bring in its train ! 
But to return to what I recollect myself about 
September and sport. One of the most amusing 
days that Papa had was with some relations of 
my husband's, who were then most prosperous 
farmers and lived in a really beautiful old farm- 
house, properly the manor-house, within a few 
miles of the county town. It took us about an 
hour and a half to drive there, and in consequence 
we had to leave early, and as I was always bidden 

255 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

in order that I might grace the dinner-party at 
six which concluded the day; I must say that 
in as far as I was concerned the expedition was 
a real penance. The exquisite old house was 
only half lived in, but the garden was a dream ; 
the hostess was a splendid practical gardener, 
and if only she would have left me alone I should 
have been all right ; but leaving a guest, even a 
related guest, to her own devices was a thing 
that no self-respecting hostess could contemplate 
with equanimity, and she was always much 
annoyed with me because I neither could nor 
would sew. " Have you not brought your 
work ? " was always the first question. Papa 
used to wink at me desperately, but I firmly 
replied, " You know I don't work," and she 
could only sigh and shake her head and groan. 
Then the " girl," in her best apron and be-ribboned 
cap tied neatly under her chin, would bring in a 
heavy silver tray with three or four black bottles, 
old-fashioned cut decanters, and some small and 
large cut wine-glasses, and all would be pressed 
to take either a " taste " of sloe gin, black-currant 
gin, ginger wine, or some other home-made cordial. 
No one refused; these home-made wines were 
famous the country through ; and it seems a pity 
that such valuable recipes are lost, or that no 
one has the patience to concoct them at the 
present day. 

This ceremony over, we would watch the sports- 
men out of sight, and the aunt would return to 
256 



"COME OUT: 'TIS NOW SEPTEMBER!" 

the kitchen, from whence savoury smells very- 
soon began to issue. But every quarter of an 
hour or so she would emerge, look at me, groan 
and shake her head. If only she had allowed 
me to help her in the kitchen I should have 
learned many most excellent receipts. Un- 
fortunately these were profound secrets, and I 
think she was as much oppressed by the idea 
that I should acquire these : though she had to 
the last day the meanest possible opinion of me 
and my acquirements : as she was by the fact 
that I could be quite happy looking at her flowers 
or reading the book I generally came provided 
with. Reading a book was in itself a crime, 
and a waste of time when there were small frocks 
to make, socks and shirts to manipulate, and 
about which I ought, had I been properly con- 
stituted, to have been busy every moment of 
the day. 

I wish I could recollect the many exquisite 
flowers the old aunt grew, but I only remember 
the vast beds of pinks, a particularly glistening 
bed of portulacca, and crowds and crowds of 
sweet-scented geraniums, the leaves of which 
were dried with the lavender and placed among 
the linen. Indeed, the whole house, once one 
escaped from the odour of the feast and got 
upstairs, was scented from the garden ; and if 
apples ripening in a disused chamber came also 
into the scents, the whole made something very 
delightful, and that I always associate with those 
J^ 257 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

long dead days. I wish I could tell the story 
of that strong race of yeomen into which my 
husband's aunt had married, but it would take 
too long ; suffice it to say that I have never 
seen handsomer men than were her husband and 
his tall and splendid brothers ; and yet they none 
of them could speak ordinary English, but con- 
versed : if one could call their limited stock 
of remarks one to the other conversation : in 
the broadest possible dialect, that took me at 
any rate some years to understand. 

I particularly recollect one of these shooting 
parties on a very fine September day, for when 
we arrived our hosts were evidently rather un- 
happy. As a rule the best sport was kept for 
Papa ; there was something to be explained : 
what was it ? Alas ! that morning had brought 
a letter from the absentee landlord, who scarcely 
or ever came down to the farm, saying that he 
hoped to arrive in a day or two with some friend, 
to whom he trusted he should be able to show 
some sport. Now the uncle had always the 
right to shoot when and where he pleased, the 
landlord only reserving to himself a couple of 
days some time during the season. That one of 
these days should be so selected as to interfere 
with Papa's sport had upset the w^orthy couple 
dreadfully, and it took some time to reassure 
them before the sportsmen went off intent upon 
rabbits at any rate, even if they must let the 
partridges and hares severely alone. The walk 
258 



"COME OUT: 'TIS NOW SEPTEMBER!" 

over the beautiful countryside with the deKghtful 
dogs, the simple open-air luncheon, meant more 
then than the battue shooting of the present day ; 
and as we had already more game than we could 
ever hope to eat in the larder at home, no one 
cared, save and except the uncle, who yearned 
to show Papa the best day's sport of his hardly 
earned holiday. So they started at last, while 
the aunt, with one despairing glance at my idle 
fingers, made off to the kitchen, while I watched 
the party out of sight and only wished I dare lose 
the last shred of good character I still possessed 
by insisting on walking with the guns ! But 
hardened sinner as I was I had not sufficient 
courage for that. 

After luncheon the aunt proceeded to make 
the round of the bedrooms, to lay out herself 
all the dress clothes, to see baths were ready 
and fires alight. She then made a last foray 
into the kitchen, attired herself in great state, 
and then she and I went into the dining-room 
to see that the table was duly in order and 
properly laid. Her dress consisted of a very 
thick brown silk with three or four flounces, 
each flounce edged with rows of black velvet ; 
the sleeves were wide and had full net sleeves 
beneath the silk, while a white fichu, a weird 
concoction of lace and net and velvet, was 
fastened beneath her chin by a large cameo 
brooch. She had, moreover, a long gold chain 
round her neck, to which her watch was attached, 

259 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

and she had the orthodox cap of the time on her 
head. This had wide lapels of lace which fell 
on each shoulder in front, and these in the heat 
of action, when carving w^nt on, were brought 
over to the back by the maid and pinned there, 
lest they should fall in the gravy or impede her 
in her really wonderful manipulation of the 
poultry or joint. We found the dining-room 
in possession of the crowning glory — and terror — 
of the day, the waiter, who was an inhabitant of 
the village and kept that day free in the year 
for this special party. As a rule he only con- 
descended to wait on the County, or in the county 
town on the military and other more distinguished 
folk, and had even been known to refuse a 
lucrative " engagement " because the would-be 
master pro tern, was in trade. So my hostess 
and her maid were in a state of mingled awe and 
terror of the great man. To tell the truth, 
" Mr. Young " as he was always addressed, knew 
his work extremely well, and I think must have 
suffered a great deal when he had to carry out 
the aunt's own ideas of what a state dinner really 
meant. Her first agitated inquiry was always 
" Did you steel the knives, Mr. Young ? " and 
being assured that they were steeled — i.e., sharp- 
ened to the very utmost of his power — the aunt 
then held forth about the wine ; then we gazed 
at the table, and found all in order, from the tall 
glass centre-piece, which held grapes, to the 
dishes of pears and apples, all named, which 
260 



"COME OUT: 'TIS NOW SEPTEMBER!" 

were to replace the sweets, which were already on 
the table, and consisted of the celebrated punch 
jelly, and, moreover, many so-called " shapes." 
These said " shapes," jellies and custards, being 
provided to fill up any corner, for the real sweets 
were a monster apple-tart and a vast plum- 
pudding, the latter served with a brandy sauce 
made from beaten-up butter, sugar, and brandy 
that always caused old George Cruikshank to 
forget he was a teetotaler, and that was of world- 
wide renown. For though the receipt for the 
" punch " jelly was never given, the brandy 
sauce was, to Papa. I fancy the other would 
have been too had he asked for it, for as a rule 
he could get anjrthing he liked out of the worthy 
couple, who were simply devoted to him. I 
have never forgotten this dinner, and I never 
shall. When we entered the dining-room an 
enormous bowl of mock-turtle soup was at one 
end of the table, and a very large covered dish 
at the other, and Mr. Young, having received 
his instructions, kept his eye on Papa and saw 
he had all he wanted, no matter who went without. 
When the soup was consumed and had been duly 
praised and commented on, the dish-cover was 
whipped off, and disclosed an enormous turbot, 
covered with a very fine damask napkin and 
beautifully trimmed with the coral from the 
lobster, parsley, and pieces of lemon, artistically 
arranged by the aunt herself. Exactly what 
the fish weighed, what the fishmonger said about 

261 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

it, and how the lobster had been procured, was 
then the subject of the conversation, and by the 
time we had progressed through the four side- 
dishes, which were placed on the table and served 
by the unhappy person who sat opposite them, 
to the enormous sirloin of beef or saddle of mutton 
at one end and boiled chickens with a tongue 
between them at the other, I for one wondered 
what would happen to those who, undeterred by 
what they had already consumed, fell upon the 
plum-pudding and did not disdain jellies and 
creams. These in their turn being recommended 
by the hostess, each by its separate name, and 
welcomed by the other members of the party 
as old friends and as something that they never 
one of them got anywhere else save at the Manor 
Farm. I honestly confess one of these feasts 
was quite enough for me, and as a rule I stayed 
away when I could, and I would generally make 
the children or the ponies my excuse. Papa 
preferred the dog-cart to my pony-carriage, and 
as this took him, my husband, the evening clothes, 
and the guns much better than did the carriage, 
it was an excellent excuse for me to stay at home. 
I had one night the most awful fright I think 
I ever received when they were at the Manor 
Farm, for instead of eleven o'clock seeing them 
home, twelve came and they were still absent. 
At one, or rather later, they returned, and by 
that time I was almost speechless with terror. 
Nothing had happened to either Papa or my 
262 



"COME OUT: 'TIS NOW SEPTEMBER!'* 

husband, but at the top of a long hill they were 
passed by a riderless steed making its way home 
as hard as it could, stirrups and reins flying in 
every direction. It was a bright moonlit night, 
and one could see a great way along the straight 
road that led from Hardy's " Kingsbere " towards 
our special town, and presently they saw lying 
out in the very middle of the road a black figure 
with arms and legs outstretched. They urged on 
their tired steed, and, coming up to the man, my 
husband dismounted, expecting to find a corpse 
duly bathed in gore. But apparently the man 
was only fast asleep ; a certain amount of 
judicious poking and prodding proved that this 
was the case ; he had slipped off his horse asleep, 
and rather the worse for liquor, and was placidly 
snoozing in the very centre of the high-road! 
It took some little time to persuade him that 
he was not in his bed, but at last he roused 
sufficiently to say, " It was the sherry"; after that 
he would have subsided again, but he was hauled 
into the dog-cart and taken back home to his 
farm. Fortunately he was known by sight, 
for he was quite unable to give his name and 
address; and as the horse had not roused any 
one and was quietly browsing along the road 
close to the farm, the youth would have spent 
the night in the road had he not been picked up 
and returned by most unwilling bearers, who 
returned home nearly two hours late, and so 
tired they both fell into their respective beds 

263 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

and slumbered sweetly until time to get up and 
start off again for another day's sport. 

Once or twice, so stirred up was Papa by his 
September experiences, that he came down in the 
winter and did a little late partridge and wild- 
fowl shooting, the latter not from the gunning 
punt, but in the milder form of " flight " ; and 
during one of these occasions of winter sport 
he shot an entirely white partridge, which stood 
stuffed for many years under a glass shade on 
the mantelpiece. On one other he plunged into 
a stream, and as the weather suddenly changed 
he froze to a solid mass of ice as he walked home ; 
his whiskers were hung with icicles, and his clothes 
were rather stiffer than an orthodox board. But 
no ill-effects happened ; he had a hot bath, 
dined in the usual way, played his usual games 
of whist, and went to bed. Every one said he 
would have rheumatic fever ; he did not even 
have a cold, and went out the next day intent on 
more wildfowl, and was most triumphant when 
he returned with two or three snipe, a widgeon, 
a wild duck, and — alas ! that I should have to 
write it — sufficient larks to make a very respect- 
able lark pudding ! Personally I flatly refuse to 
allow larks to be either shot, or even cooked in my 
kitchen, but my aunt did not share my prejudice, 
and lark pudding was a much-appreciated dish 
when Papa could shoot the poor little things. 

The best days' shooting were, I think, with 
the " Bandersnatch " and a friend of his whose 
264 



"COME OUT: 'TIS NOW SEPTEMBER!" 

property adjoined. The " Bandersnatch's " un- 
failing hospitality and good temper made up 
for what he lacked as a sportsman ; for I do not 
think he had really ever handled a gun until he 
had made money and retired on a very handsome 
fortune, earned entirely off his own very well 
wielded bat. When he first contemplated setting 
up as a country gentleman he planted a forest 
of rhododendrons for covert for the pheasants 
he meant to rear, but when he found they objected 
to the sticky flower-buds which fell on their 
feathers, and in consequence preferred anything 
they could get to the rhododendrons ; he took 
counsel of others, and soon had an excellent supply 
of birds. The next step he took was to engage 
an expert poacher as his gamekeeper ; and though 
this is occasionally not a bad thing to do, this 
particular man was not a success, especially as 
he tried his best to urge on any dogs that might 
be out with their masters in the way a poacher 
always does when he is out on his own. He 
nearly drove " Idstone " mad one afternoon 
when he had out a young setter by his lunatic 
way of urging the dog forward and his " Loo ! 
there. Loo ! Have 'em out boy ! Fetch 'em out ! " 
until at last " Idstone " extracted half a crown 
from his waistcoat pocket and threw it at him. 
" If you want half a crown," he cried, " take it, 
but for Heaven's sake don't spoil my dog." Joe 
picked up the half-crown with a thin smile and 
stopped urging on the dog ; albeit I do not think 

265 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

he had the least idea of what crime he had been 
guilty. All the same he always had a vast 
respect for " Idstone," andwas not above learn- 
ing from him by degrees what to do, and above 
all what not to, do when he had young dogs 
out with a shooting party. 

Our September was a good deal spoiled when 
Papa ceased to shoot, which he did after an awful 
day when some one shot one of the keepers in 
the eye and wounded him so severely that his 
sight was entirely lost. A good deal of anxiety 
was often caused by " other people " at shooting 
parties. The " Bandersnatch " had friends who 
were no better sportsmen than himself, and one 
or two other newcomers in our district also 
developed homicidal tendencies ; so Papa, whose 
living depended on his sight, ceased to shoot, 
and our Septembers became much the same : 
considered socially at least : as any other month 
in the year. But as far as we personally were 
concerned September was always the month of 
months, and, indeed, in a very meagre measure 
is so still. I can always recall those earliest 
days when our faithful dogs : long since gone 
to the Heaven that will not be Heaven without 
them : were lying out on the garden path waiting 
for the master to come out with his gun and 
whistle them up to the cart. The mornings were 
always fine then, a soft mist was always drifting 
along the hills, meaning heat later on, the black- 
birds and thrushes were quarrelling over the 
266 



"COME OUT: 'TIS NOW SEPTEMBER!" 

mulberries in the great tree on the lawn, an 
early robin seemed to be always singing on the 
roses on the front of the house, and a holiday 
air hung about the whole place. Still later we 
had the very nicest little bit of shooting in the 
whole place, away from the world and close to 
the sea. Here we had the invaluable services 
of a well-known poacher, who, however, poached 
for us and for us only, and was in consequence 
the delight of our hearts. Personally I once 
hated him fiercely, for I am very much attached 
to birds of all sorts and sizes, and I had marked 
with joy the fact that in some trees in a ravine 
bordering our special fields a couple of magpies 
had erected their large untidy nest and were 
bringing up a family. I looked forward to seeing 
that family strutting about in their delightful 
black and white feathers ; but to my horror 
the man waited until they were about ready to 
fly, when he shinned up the tree in the night 
and caught and slew the entire nursery, and the 
mother as well. He laid out the bodies in a row 
next day, and was quite surprised that I was 
extremely angry at his wholesale murder. But 
gamekeepers and poachers alike hate anything 
they think will destroy the " birds," and nothing 
is a "bird" in their eyes unless it is game, and 
as such to be preserved until such time as it 
please the masters to go forth and shoot, and 
take them with them on the only jaunt worth 
having in their eyes. 

267 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

Our poacher-keeper was such a character that 
no account of our Septembers would be com- 
plete without further description of him. In our 
time he was a shepherd as well, and lived in a 
pretty little cottage close to our shooting and 
to his master's farm, and nearly the whole of 
his furniture was made by himself and covered 
with the skins of defunct foxes. This sounds 
dreadful, naturally, but really it was nothing of 
the kind. Foxes and rabbits bred one against 
the other in the cliffs ; no hounds could have 
existed within miles ; and though a pack had 
hunted there once or twice ; when some of the 
best hounds fell over the cliffs into the sea, the 
master turned his back on the place, and those 
foxes which could not be " bagged " and sent 
inland were shot or trapped ; and our keeper took 
care that their coats should be of use, and he 
had quite a quantity all about his cottage. 

The man who rented the shooting before we 
did was not a very judicious person, and instead 
of making a friend of our poacher, impounded 
his illicit traps and made an enemy of him for life. 
He was quite right in his action ; all the same 
if you want sport and a poacher lives on your 
doorstep, as it were; you are wise if you and 
that poacher are friends, and you wink at any 
little peccadillos you may perceive, and see 
nothing save just what he wants you to. For 
mark what follows ; for the three seasons we 
were in possession, at a rent so ridiculous I shall 
268 



" COME OUT : 'TIS NOW SEPTEMBER ! " 

not put it down, we had rather more game than 
we could not only eat ourselves, but distribute 
among sundry friends. The useful rabbit was 
a drug in the market, and I had always to drive 
into the town the day after a shoot of one or 
at the most two guns, and distribute them 
among those who would condescend to take 
them off our hands. We never preserved, never 
hatched out one single pheasant or partridge, 
but there were always enough and to spare ; 
and I think our keeper took care they were 
awaiting us, somehow, and was not particular 
whose birds they were so long as they were on 
our place and ready to be shot when required. 
I once got a peep into his methods that was most 
entertaining. We had a very delightful wood 
close to the little house we then rented, and here 
very often pheasants came in to roost. At one 
time I had thirteen beauties there, which came 
slowly and majestically down to the front door 
and condescended to eat Indian corn almost from 
my hands, quite from about my feet; and I, 
moreover, encouraged them to come by the old 
poaching trick of placing raisins about flavoured 
with aniseed, a thing no pheasant can ever refuse. 
Unfortunately my tame pheasants were shot by 
their own owner, and I was bewailing their loss 
when one night there arose a most unholy noise 
in our poultry yard. Some one said foxes ; 
another one said thieves ; my maid rang the 
dinner-bell out of the window, and I looked on, 

269 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

while my husband got his gun and a dressing- 
gown and prepared to go on the war-path. I 
then saw our keeper run out of the yard and up 
across the adjoining field. Poor man ! he was 
far more frightened than we were. He had seen 
our guinea-fowls roosting in the trees ; he had 
heard of my tame pheasants ; he thought the 
guinea-fowls were the pheasants, and went to 
draw them down by the old poaching trick of 
a pole and a wire, when, instead of coming down 
quietly, as a sleepy pheasant generally will, the 
guinea-fowls set up their own awful and peculiar 
scream, than which nothing is more alarming 
in the world. Indeed, if one is within reach of 
help, guinea-fowls are better than watch-dogs ; 
they call out in a moment if a stranger is about, 
and do not make a noise if the step they hear 
is one that is familiar to them. " You will not 
get a feather off the place," said the last tenant 
with a sniff when he heard we had taken it. 
The last two months we were there we had 
twenty pheasants, ten brace of partridges, and 
half a dozen hares, and I cannot recollect the 
number of rabbits ; and we could have had as 
many more if we had liked ! The pheasants, 
by the way, all coming out of a little spinney 
of less than an acre. 

Long before those days I used to like a Sep- 
tember day at the small farm we rented better 
than anything else, for we could go up alone and 
either have some ferreting or a stroll with the 
270 



"COME OUT: 'TIS NOW SEPTEMBER!" 

dogs through the turnips. One of my aunts used 
to say, " No gentleman ever walks with his gun 
loaded," such a terror did she have of the weapon 
itself ; but I used to love the walks, and the way 
the dogs turned out the partridges or an occa- 
sional pheasant. Though I used to wish I could 
dispense with my skirt when the great turnip 
leaves turned over and wet me through with the 
accumulated heavy dew or the rain of the night 
before. I did not love the ferrets, but I did love 
their work, the way they bustled into the holes, 
where I could hear the rabbits in the run stamping 
to warn each other that an enemy was at hand. 
Then the rabbit would bolt out, to be neatly 
bowled over by my husband, when the ferret 
would emerge with an astonished air, looking 
round as much as to say, " Where on this earth 
has the creature got to ? " Once we lost the 
dearest of little dogs down the rabbit-holes ; 
I was not out that day, and he had no business 
to have been either, but he took himself up to 
the farm, and for three horrible days and nights 
he was wandering about the passages unable to 
get out, and apparently unable to make himself 
heard. At last he emerged, spent and starved ; 
we did our best for him, but the precious little 
pet died, and took, as do all one's dogs, a large 
piece of my heart with him. 

Next to the bit of rough shooting we had in our 
later days, the water-fowl shooting in the harbour 
was the most enjoyable thing; for the men at 

271 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

any rate. For me, except when I assisted at 
" flight " it was anything but a time of joy. In 
quite early days the shooters used to be out all 
night long, and an old muzzle-loader punt-gun 
was used with deadly effect ; but that meant for 
me two or three days and nights of absolute 
solitude in the depths of the winter, and I was 
not sorry when exigencies of business made this 
almost impossible. Besides, the sport very soon 
became not worth the candle. The men " down to 
sea " obtained big punt-guns too ; every one who 
could shoot shot, and it became dangerous to be 
out at night when no one quite knew who would be 
out at the same time. We declined from shooting 
on to the much pleasanter sport of looking up the 
birds and their habits ; and we were proud indeed 
when we took Professor Newton down the river and 
showed him that the curlew nested in a southern 
county, a fact that he was not aware of until we 
showed him the nest and eggs all complete. 

The fishermen of the harbour then were great 
naturalists, and our especial friend, Charley, took 
me about and gave me the material for many 
of the natural history papers I began to write. 
Charley was not beautiful to look at, but he could 
call any bird — " tolling " he called it — so that it 
would stop, listen, circle round and round in the 
air, and finally, if we were in the boat, would 
settle on some part of it. With him I visited the 
heronry, which is to this day a splendid sight in 
spring ; he disclosed to me where the peregrine 
272 



" COME OUT : 'TIS NOW SEPTEMBER ! " 

falcon nested and still nests, protected by land- 
owners, gamekeepers (mirabile dictul), and all 
alike ; and he used to fish the river for us for the 
salmon, a sport I abhorred, for the poor creatures 
were netted and were hammered on the head to 
death, while we had to sit and look on. 

Frank Buckland was the origin of the revival of 
the salmon in our river, and he came down some 
time late in the 'fifties or early in the 'sixties, and 
told my father-in-law how to set to work. But if I 
were to tell all the history of the river it would 
want a book to itself. Dear river ! always musical, 
always delightful, even in winter, when we skated; 
while in summer it was perfect, with its densely 
sedged banks, where one found the hanging nest of 
the reed-warbler, where daisies, forget-me-nots, 
and ragged robin were one mass; where on the river 
itself were water-lilies, and later on in the " lakes " 
(i.e., ditches cut in the water-meadows for drain- 
age) we found the pink flowering rush, an ex- 
quisite flower that I fear will disappear, as have the 
osmunda and many another plant and flower, now 
our old silent playground has become the over- 
crowded haunt of the iconoclastic tourist. Sep- 
tember is nothing to them save the month that 
ends their holidays ; it is the one month in the year 
that holds nothing but happy memories for me. 
Heaven knows I was dull enough in my first year 
in the country, but never in September — that was 
ajewelled month; and I hopeit will remain so, until 
I have no further use on earth for any months at all! 
s 273 



CHAPTER XI 

SOME OF THE FARMS 

No account of my life would be in the least 
complete without some few words about the farms 
I knew the best of all. Some families are happy 
in possessing a relation who may be depended on 
at any moment of the night or day to come to 
the rescue and the help of any sufferer in mind, 
body, or estate, and I am proud to remember that 
in one of my husband's aunts we had such an 
invaluable stand-by. Indeed, my first real intro- 
duction to what a farm-life meant was when I 
went to stay as a " grand young lady from 
London " at the ever- to-be-beloved North Farm. 
Please notice the italics ! They mark a quotation, 
for it was " Little Auntie " herself who told me 
how she had looked forward with dread to my 
visit and solemnly lectured her delightful husband 
on his temerity in inviting me to their house. 
We had made the acquaintance of the husband 
through our unfailing friend " Idstone," and to 
his care my eldest brother was committed when 
he announced that he wished to learn farming 
274 



SOME OF THE FARMS 

and end his days as a farmer in some country 
place. I think the poor man must have had an 
awful time on the first occasion he came to 
Pembridge Villas. He knew nothing about 
London ; we were all entirely strange to him; and 
he was quite an hour late for dinner ! Papa had 
notwaited; he did not give more than ten minutes' 
law, once it was dinner-time, to the most dis- 
tinguished guest that ever entered our doors ; he 
was not in the least hkely to give an hour to 
any one coming to talk business, and we were 
nearly through dinner when the good farmer 
appeared. He was hot, flustered, tired, evidently 
famished, and quite as evidently alarmed at 
having dinner brought back for him ; but I took 
him under my youthful wing, saw he was fed 
and calmed down, and we ended our evening with 
a game of whist, which he and Papa alike loved ; 
and he finished up by inviting me to join my 
brother when he returned to the North Farm, 
after the Christmas holidays were over. 

It was pitch-dark and a pouringly wet night 
when we arrived at the extremely primitive 
station perched on the top of a hill ; and I think — 
in fact, I am sure — that there was only one oil 
lamp to show us where we were, while the station- 
master looked for our luggage with a small bull's- 
eye lantern. He officiated as porter as well, and 
having told us just what box we could manage 
to take on the 'bus, he informed us that a farm- 
cart was coming for the rest ; and he escorted us 

275 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

out of the station, my hat and skirts flying in 
the breeze, and finally pushed us into a vehicle 
more unlike my idea of an omnibus than anything 
I have ever beheld. From the interior a familiar 
voice denoted that our host had come to meet us, 
and we were immensely amused to hear all he 
had to say to the station-master. Albeit my 
amusement was tempered with extreme alarm ; 
we had the " young horse " between the shafts ; 
the beast was already in fits over the recently 
departed train, the rain and the wind penetrated 
even his long and shaggy coat, and presently he 
dashed off, helter-skelter, down the road and 
through the village and up the roughest, longest, 
and darkest lane I have ever seen. Finally we 
pulled up sharply ; we were to get out into the 
pitch-dark and find the house. Our hostess had 
given strict injunctions that we were to come in 
at the front door, and how to find that door I for 
one could not tell. The wind was simply scream- 
ing, the rain coming down in torrents, the " young 
horse " determined to get to his stable without 
more ado, and there was I alone in the dark, 
getting blown to shreds and almost wet through. 
At last I saw a red light, and made for that. It 
was my first and last appearance at the company 
entrance. After that I always went into the 
great, delightful old kitchen, where, after I was 
found not to be " company " in any sense of the 
word, we always had breakfast, and spent the 
evening over a vast log fire that apparently never 
276 



SOME OF THE FARMS 

went out — I am sure the back log never did — and 
was always a joy to me as long as the days of 
the North Farm lasted. 

When I stayed there bad times for farmers 
were just beginning to be very serious things. 
The power the landlords possessed was enormous. 
Every improvement the farmer made was for the 
benefit of the landlord ; rabbits and hares cleared 
up his crops, he might neither shoot nor trap ; 
and, indeed, all he might do was to sink his capital 
in the land, hoping vainly to retrieve it before 
his lease ran out or he was bidden to go. I used 
to ride all over the land with the farmer and hear 
what he had spent and what he had done with 
his fields ; how he had drained such a piece of 
down land and put it down to corn, and how 
much it had cost him. Then the agent came 
along, noted the improvement, and had suggested 
that the place would be worth more rent at the 
end of the year, as all was looking so remarkably 
well. It was pathetic, too, to learn how entirely 
the farmer was in the hands, first of the landlord, 
and then of the weather, how anxiously the glass 
was tapped, how the markets were watched, and 
how sometimes a very simple thing apparently, 
meant either success or ruin. If a field of turnips 
wanted rain, the next field to that cried out 
impatiently for hot sunshine ; and long before 
I ceased to visit at the Farm I could not help 
wondering how any one could become a farmer. 
Everything appeared to war against him ; even 

277 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

a particularly obnoxious weed called locally 
*' charlick," which is, I think, wild mustard, 
started up and defied him at every unexpected 
place ; while he was too good a sportsman himself 
to demand from the hunt the compensation that 
was his due, even if such a demand would have 
brought him a tithe of what he had lost. There 
was no barbed wire then in the hedges ; favourite 
meets were often just above the house; and I have 
not unseldom seen the hunt in full cry across the 
fields, and even across the garden, while still 
more disastrous events occurred in the poultry 
yard. I recollect at least twenty turkeys, and 
I should be afraid to say how many ducks and 
chickens, disappearing in one night ; in conse- 
quence no best winter dress was forthcoming; 
that year, though I am quite sure the hunt 
would have depleted the " poultry fund " for 
" little Auntie," so great a favourite was she with 
them all. Tea was always ready when the 
huntsmen jogged by on their way home ; strong 
beer was always in the cellar ; other mysterious 
home-made cordials were universally forthcoming ; 
and cherry brandy was never refused to any one 
who " looked in " after a long day and over the 
great wood fire described the run of the season 
to our enraptured ears. 

On the surface at least the life at the farm was 
a delightful and most prosperous one ; one had 
to look below the surface to know what it really 
meant. The food was more than ample ; there 
278 



SOME OF THE FARMS 

were always great hams and flitches of bacon 
suspended from the kitchen ceiHng from enormous 
hooks ; mutton and beef, chickens and ducks 
were grown on the place ; great bowls of cream 
and baskets of eggs and pounds of butter filled 
the shelves in the delightful inner dairy, and the 
bread was made from the wheat threshed out 
on the barn-floor by hand, with the good old 
flails. The bread was made and baked at home 
in a brick oven, and I recollect it being put to 
rise in front of the fire over-night in a vast 
earthenware crock, covered by a linen cloth. It 
was left there all night, or at least until very 
early in the morning, when it was put in square 
tins into the oven, which had been heated with 
enormous bundles of furze cut from the uplands. 
I always much disliked the furze — called " fuzz " 
locally — being cut or burned, as it was sometimes 
for the grass to grow for the sheep. I love the 
golden furze, never out of blossom, or only out 
of flower, says the local proverb, when kissing is 
out of fashion ; and it required vast stores to heat 
the yawning brick oven, in which not only was 
the bread baked, but a good deal of other cooking 
done at the same time. London housekeepers 
smile at the old-fashioned receipts which begin 
" Take a dozen eggs and a quart of cream," but 
at the North Farm these directions were carried 
out without a qualm. Money was apparently 
never required there except to pay the tolls, or 
on a Saturday night to pay the men, for all other 

279 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

purchases were conducted on a species of sale 
and barter line. Pounds of butter and dozens of 
eggs went into the draper's, and returned in the 
shape of dress-lengths and household linen, and 
the local doctor was paid in hay and straw. No 
farmer in those days was allowed to sell his hay 
and straw off the land ; yet I know it was ex- 
changed; while yet again stacks of both have 
simply stood and perished because no one could 
buy them, lest the ever-vigilant agent should 
come round and see just what had happened to 
the stacks in the Barton. 

Mr. R. had come from a small farm, where he 
had been immensely prosperous, owing to the 
high prices he obtained for his wheat in the time 
of the Crimean War, to the much larger North 
Farm ; and very soon after he had made the 
move corn that sold at East Holme at from £15 
to £20 a load went down to £9 and £12. But 
really bad times did not arrive until the New 
Zealand meat began to cut out our English lambs 
and cows ; then things were " shocking," and the 
£12,000 sunk in the land and stock began to 
appear as if they were quite gone. Yet here 
please read and mark a sentence spoken by an 
old Free-Trader : " When the landowner and 
farmer are prosperous, then the middle classes 
and the labourers starve." The labourers are 
far better off now than they used to be ; and if 
the landowners are not very happy, let them 
remember the days of old, when they were little 
280 



SOME OF THE FARMS 

gods, when they held the farmers in the hollow 
of their hands, and when they used their powers 
tyrannously and made themselves hated in a 
manner they all too often deserved. 

I shall never forget one day when the tenant 
of the North Farm received the usual lordly 
intimation that his particular " owner " was 
coming to shoot and would require what he called 
luncheon prepared for him after the day's sport 
was over : that is to say, about half-past four. 
We knew of the proposed invasion only the 
afternoon of the day before, as if too much notice 
were given, the farmer might hide anything he 
did not wish the Squire to see. He might also 
in some mysterious manner import birds if he 
had surreptitiously killed those on his own land. 
In consequence, when the imperative command 
to be ready for the Squire arrived we were one 
and all pressed into the service. Plate was got 
out ; old cut glass rubbed and polished until it 
shone again ; the kitchen and dining-room were 
cleaned and furbished up ; and I was allowed to 
bring in berries and whatever I could find to 
deck the table and make it look as pretty as I 
could in January with only a tiny glass-house 
at my service, where last summer's geraniums 
were encouraged to live by the aid of sundry oil 
lamps, and from whence I could gather just a 
few very sparse blooms of scarlet, pink, and white. 
I verily believe that " Little Auntie " and her two 
maids sat up all night to concoct that luncheon, 

281 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

for savoury smells pervaded the house all through 
the hours of darkness ; and early as the household 
always was in the morning, the members thereof 
were up and about before 4 a.m. I could hear 
the stir and bustle, and solemnly cursed the 
Squire for causing my slumbers to be broken in 
on by the noise of clinking pails and stamping 
horses, while the labourers who were to act as 
beaters had to get through their day's work in 
the dark before the shooting began. In those 
days I had never seen the Squire, and I was 
very anxious to do so, but I was told I was on no 
account to be visible, and that I must watch for 
him out of my window if I wished to look at him. 
The pretty farm-servant was also sent home for 
the day and only the elderly cook and the aunt 
were hovering about when the party was due. 
It was one of the extraordinary habits of this 
special Squire that he turned night into day and 
day into night, and he only rose during the hours 
of light when sport was on hand. He had already 
given up the hounds, but he still shot occasionally; 
and I was greatly surprised to find that he started 
to shoot between one and two, thus giving 
himself barely two hours' sport, on that farm at 
any rate. Mr. R. waited about from 11 to 1.30, 
getting more angry as every hour went by ; 
finally we snatched a meal standing round the 
kitchen table, and while doing so a mounted 
messenger came up. " The Squire and his 
friends were in the upper fields ; please come at 

282 



SOME OF THE FARMS 

once and see that all was correct." If the farmer 
had been the Squire's bond-slave he could not 
have been treated in a less courteous manner ; 
but he could only clap on his hat, grasp his stick 
— he was not allowed to shoot, not he ! — and, 
calling the men together, went off at once, when 
we proceeded to look to the so-called luncheon, 
which was more like an elaborate dinner than 
anything else. It was quite dark when the 
sportsmen came to the house. I rushed up to 
my room, and, leaving the door open, heard all 
that was going on. The Squire fell over the 
door-mat, and uttered his usual volley of curses. 
One of his boon companions, already " half seas 
over," swaggered into the dining-room with his 
hat on, which presently he removed and gave to 
the farmer's wife, with strict injunctions to put 
it down by the fire and keep it warm, so that 
he should not take cold when he replaced it on 
his head. Yet a third was singing at the top 
of his voice ; and all pushed and struggled into 
the dining-room, demanding to have their boots 
removed, without the smallest regard to their 
hostess's very good carpet and most immaculate 
chairs. Not one word of this shooting party is 
exaggerated. It took place late in January 
1868, quite forty years ago; and one can but be 
thankful that " bad times " have reduced such 
landlords to order and that most farmers can 
shoot their own hares and rabbits, and can make 
their own terms in a measure with the owners of 

283 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

the soil. I, moreover, heard the Squire remark 

that Mr. R. must be making a d d good thing 

out of farming to be able to give him such a 
spread and such wine ; and he departed with his 
charming following, whooping and shouting down 
the lane, leaving a couple of rabbits and a hare 
behind him, and doing that in a manner that 
made me long to throw them after him as he 
turned out of the Barton into the long dark lane. 
Yet Mr. R. had no lease of his farm — only a yearly 
tenancy : farms were then much sought after. 
Anything like independence of manner would 
have meant " the sack," and Mr. R., who was 
by birth a Dissenter and a very strong Radical, 
formed one of the Squire's train at election time 
and voted blue, though his conscience was as pink 
as his cheeks when he had to go into the polling 
booth and record his vote for a man he not only 
hated, but despised. 

I recollect a sort of " party " we had at the 
farm when the shooting was over and I was found 
not to be as formidable as I was expected to be ; 
and I must say that I have never seen a weirder 
assemblage than those good folks made. To 
impress me the ladies had come in their best 
clothes. There were about six of them ; they one 
and all wore most enormous crinolines, with 
wide flounced skirts over them ; their heads 
were distended with pads and any amount of 
false hair ; indeed, one of their brothers unbent 
sufficiently as the evening went on to suggest 
284 



SOME OF THE FARMS 

they had annexed the farm-horses' tails to produce 
the effect ; while they one and all wore the largest 
beads round their necks I ever saw, rows upon 
rows, which clanked as they moved and nearly 
drove me, at any rate, frantic with the noise. 
We played round games ; some of the young 
women obliged by playing and singing; and finally 
at supper healths were drunk. One of the young 
men, bowing profoundly, said to me : " Will you 
sip with me ? " and I nearly disgraced myself 
by refusing. I thought he asked me to share his 
glass ; he merely meant me to " take wine " with 
him, a fashion exploded long before my time in 
London, but which still lingered on in the wilds 
of the country. Not very long ago I saw the 
grandchildren of these weird and appalling men 
and women, simply clad in country clothes ; the 
girls in blouses and short skirts and the lads in 
riding clothes, with gently modulated voices and 
with only an accent instead of a violent dialect ; 
they were ladies and gentlemen. How they 
have managed this I do not know, but such is the 
case. If the squires have disappeared a very 
respectable substitute for them is growing up ; 
and no doubt in another generation the accent 
as well as the dialect will have disappeared too. 
It was very difficult in the 'sixties to educate 
this special class, for unless the lads were near 
enough to a town to go to one of the several 
excellent grammar schools, they had to depend 
entirely on anything they could pick up ; while 

285 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

the girls in several farms shared a governess, and 
she naturally enough was not of a very high class. 
We had, indeed, a fearsome specimen or two to 
deal with, or rather I should say the farmers' 
wives had, for I had literally nothing to do with 
them, except to pick one up on the stairs one 
night when she was stupefied with laudanum. 
But that was not a pleasant adventure, especially 
as I, being a stranger, was detailed to find out 
how she got the stuff, and had a tremendous 
quarrel with the chemist on the subject. He had 
had no right to supply it without a prescription ; 
he had done so believing the governess's story 
that it was required for hot fomentations for 
"Little Auntie," who once had rheumatic fever 
frightfully, and had to have quantities used for 
this purpose by the governess, who had been her 
devoted nurse ! 

I think both minds and bodies in the country 
are better now than they were in those days, for 
in another farm close by the only son used to 
have the most awful epileptic fits, in one of which 
he died in the hunting field. The mother became 
melancholy, the daughter married and died, and 
I do not know what has become of the farm. 

The last time I saw the North Farm it was 
derelict ; all the good gates and fencing were 
down, the latter replaced by the abominable 
barbed wire ; the " charlick " flourished un- 
checked; the down, broken up at great cost 
for corn, had become down-land once more; 
286 



SOME OF THE FARMS 

only the peewits called where the ploughman 
once whistled gaily, and the meadows, now 
undrained, were half under water, and no one 
save a labourer lived in a corner of the dear old 
house. 

In a village the other side of that special town 
there used to be quite a large colony of farmers 
and their families, and in the days of prosperity 
they must one and all have had a splendid time. 
Unfortunately they intermarried to such an 
extent that the race is almost extinct, and only 
about three elderly folk are alive of what once 
formed a settlement of their own. But before 
I leave the North Farm quite I must tell one 
or two more things about it, for here the snow- 
drops grow wild to such an extent that in spring 
the churchyard and some of the fields look as if 
a white cloth were laid down. The parson in 
my time had one of the most beautiful women 
in the world as his wife, and it was a delight to 
me to see her come into church with her enormous 
brood of children, all charmingly pretty, and one 
and all destined later on to serve in the Queen's 
forces in all parts of the world. Even the girls 
were soldiers' wives, soldiers' nurses; and all 
were as happy and charming as they were sweet 
to look on. The father had money of his own ; 
he could not have kept up the big rectory or even 
fed the children, if he had not ; and I used to love 
to be sent on some message to the rectory, to 
walk on the terrace above the exquisite garden 

287 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

and to rush about the wide hall and stairs in a 
wild game of romps with the rectory children. 
I was sorry indeed when the rector died young 
and the children and mother left; but the next 
rector was extremely nice, very unlike the 
present-day parson, who all too often in the 
country is afraid to unbend, and while he is often 
enough, too, scarcely a gentleman : as one used to 
use the word : dares not mix with his parishioners 
lest they should be impelled to take liberties 
with him. I do not fancy the last rector I knew 
there was as well off as his predecessor, as he 
took " Indian children " and his daughter taught 
them. I wish I could write the history of that 
country rectory as it was then. Many of those 
children had been through the horrors of the 
Indian Mutiny; many are now famous soldiers, 
while one of the grandsons of the house is a still 
more famous K.C., and will be a judge before 
many years pass away. His mother had married 
young a clever young doctor in London, who was 
on the high road to fame and wealth, when he 
was called in to a case of diphtheria. The disease 
had not long been known, but he understood how 
to deal with it. Tracheotomy was necessary; 
the tube became clogged ; the doctor sucked the 
tube, and saved the lad's life at the cost of his 
own. The doctor died, leaving his wife and three 
children to battle with the world ; the boy he 
saved lived to become a criminal and to end, I 
believe, his useless life on the gallows as a 
288 



SOME OF THE FARMS 

murderer of a particularly brutal kind. Yet 
perhaps the struggle for existence that the mother 
had was the best thing for her children ; all did 
well, and one, as I said before, is a famous lawyer. 
Yet it seems hard that such a life should have 
been ended so early, and I can but hope that 
the sacrifice of the one meant the making of the 
many. All the " Indian children " got on in 
life ; and even now many excellent men and women 
must remember as lovingly as I do the sweet 
rectory and the wide garden where they worked 
and played. The last time I was in that house 
the rector was regarding with a perplexed frown 
a peacock and a pea-hen which had been sent 
him in a couple of rush baskets, " to grace the 
terrace," said the donor. The peacock was 
called Moses, because of the rush basket, and the 
pea-hen, Pharaohina, for Pharaoh's daughter; 
but the rector looked at them with dread. He 
knew the harm peacocks could do in a garden. I, 
always superstitious, told him how they invariably 
brought bad luck. He, contemplating his neat 
rows of peas and cabbages, and his tidy bedded- 
out geraniums, said he could quite well believe 
in the bad luck. Was it merely a coincidence that 
the Sunday after Moses and his consort took pos- 
session of the rectory terrace the rector had a 
*' seizure " in the pulpit ? Anyhow he had, was 
helped home and put to bed, whence he never 
emerged until he was brought out in his coffin to be 
laid to rest in the beautiful little churchyard ! 

T 289 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

Close to the church were the weirdest remains 
of an old manor-house, of which no one knows 
the history or has any record. There are traces 
of a garden, where strange flowers come up now 
and again, and extensive cellarage points to the 
fact that whoever the owners used to be, they were 
fond of good cheer. But all about that county 
are similar traces of vanished homes and extinct 
families. I could take you to a great field where 
two vast gates stand derelict and forgotten ; 
I could show you a house shattered and falling 
in ruins, once the home of the great Russell 
family, and where Motley, the historian of the 
Dutch Republic, fell asleep for the last time ; I 
could show you ruins of old manor-houses, and yet 
more manor-houses turned into farmsteads and 
labourers' cottages, where there are still hiding- 
places where jewels and money used to be kept ; or 
where smuggled brandies and laces were placed, 
until such time as they could be profitably dealt 
with. 

Then there are most excellent ghosts always to 
be heard of in these buildings ; ghosts who flit 
up and down the stairs with lamps in their hands ; 
while a quite superior ghost was laid by a Christ- 
mas adventure that may be worth telling, because 
it is true and because it shows how easily those 
things start into Kfe and grow, if no one is strong- 
minded enough to tackle the thing on the spot. 
One Christmas a large party of nephews and 
nieces was assembled in the Manor Farm, and had 
of course spent part of the evening in telling each 
290 



SOME OF THE FARMS 

other ghost-stories. At last all went to bed ; two 
cousins sharing the ghost-room, and pretending 
to be far braver than they were, shut the door, 
undressed with great rapidity, and then plunged 
into the vast four-poster, taking care, however, 
that both matches and candle were well within 
reach. Now the original of the Manor ghost was 
supposed to have returned home unexpectedly, 
found his wife with her lover, and then to have shot 
her, the lover, and finally himself ; after which the 
blood was heard to drop slowly down and then 
was seen to run along the floor. The girls were 
not asleep when to their horror they heard the 
pistol shots ; they clutched each other and sat 
up in bed. Oh ! horrible ! by the light of the 
fire they saw blood on the floor, and, not waiting 
for anything else, they leaped out of bed and 
flung themselves into the room of their host and 
hostess, who in night-caps and night-garments 
were sleeping the sleep of the just after the 
fatigues of the day. The worthy couple arose, 
and, clad in long dressing-gowns, went into the 
next-door room. There, sure enough, was the 
blood. The old lady flung open the cupboard door 
under which it was percolating, while her husband 
lighted the candles ! Alas ! for the ghost. A 
row of bottled black-currants had burst their 
bonds, owing to the heat of the fire, no doubt ; 
the pistols were the corks flying out, and the gore 
was the excellent juice, which was intended for 
many a winter pie. The girls never heard the 
last of the ghost, and were never particularly 

291 



FHKSIT T.KAVES AND GHKKN PASTUIIKS 

pleased to bo asked to have bottled black-currant 
tart. All the same, had they flown in alarm from 
the house and refused toeiiter it a«»aiii what excel- 
lent ^rhosts Nvoidd have always held sway at the 
Manor Farm 1 I have not the smallest doubt that, 
treated similarly : that is to say, investigated at 
once: all j^hosts would disappear in an equally 
satisfactory inHiuier ; but they are all too often 
either not looked into at all, or much too late 
to be of the very smallest use. 

The oldliine farinhouse, with its (locks of sons 
and dauohleis; its stores of jams and jellies, wines 
and preserves of all sorts and kinds, has quite 
disappeared in the district 1 knew best. When 
the farmers have money they educate their chil- 
dren ; they themselves are educated; and they 
send to the stores in I.ondon for any [)rovisions 
they may want. They ouj»ht to be prosperous, 
and, indeed, some are, for prices have frone up in 
the most astouishinn- way, while of course others 
have equally j^one down; but these, if 1 except 
corn, are all in the farmer's favour. When I 
married, butter and honey were always priced the 
same, and were generally scvei\penee a pound ; 
egjjs were sevenpenee a score from Fet)ruary until 
October, tenpence a dozen from then on to 
February. Now the clieapest ejjfgs one can get 
in the coimtry are about tenpence a dozen in the 
most fertile part of the year. True, 55ugar was 
sixpence a pound ; now it is twopenee-halfpeiuiy ; 
but meat was cheaper than it is now, and my 
292 



SOME OF THE FARMS 

dear old friend the butcher never charged me more 
than ninepence for mutton and eightpence for 
beef, and about the same for veal. Compare these 
prices with the best Enghsh meat of to-day ; and 
yet I am told farmers are getting only threepence 
a pound for their fat sheep ! All I want to know 
is, who gets them at this price, for some one must 
be making money hand over fist. The careful 
housekeeper has to pay more for New Zealand 
meat ; and I for one have not seen any English 
meat now for many a year. 

There is a class of so-called farmer nowadays 
that is really nothing save a labourer, and that 
class is doing a good deal of harm both to the 
occupation and to the land itself. A small trades- 
man or even a '* dairy chap " saves or inherits a 
couple of hundred pounds ; he is let into a farm, 
and proceeds first to rob it of every shilling he can, 
and then to let the hedges and gates get into the 
most disgraceful state possible. " Cursed be he 
who removeth his neighbour's landmark," says 
the cheerful Commination Service; but I say, 
Cursed be he who mounteth barbed wire, and its 
second cousin the hideous and abominable corru- 
gated iron roofing ! The untidy farmer mends 
his fences with the one, and claps the other on his 
stacks, and on the labourers' cottages; until a 
place in the hands of one of these men becomes 
the veriest plague-spot on the face of the country- 
side. There are enough bylaws to keep every 
dairy and farmstead in perfect order, but who, 

293 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

I should like to know, is to put them in force ? 
I know farms where the yard is over shoes in 
manure all the winter, where the cows are filthy 
and never washed, where the milk only does not 
turn sour because it is " separated " at once, the 
cream made into butter and the milk cast to the 
pigs ; and where cow after cow has died of milk- 
fever. And the farmer has cursed his luck, but 
never blamed himself for his own stupidity. 
The old-time farmer had his book of prescriptions 
handed down from father to son, and never sent 
for a vet. except for something very extraordinary. 
Now no one knows how to treat a sick beast ; 
the vet. is sent for, and the profits go before ever 
they are made. I know one farmer of this class 
who was a mere " dairy chap " ; he married the 
mistress's daughter, and he became a farmer. His 
daughters will not touch the dairy work or the 
hay. He and his wife are growing old now, but the 
children are married and gone into small shops. 
The farm is a disgrace to see, but who cares ? 
Somehow the landlord gets his rent. Fancy what 
the profit would be if the place were decently looked 
after and stocked and cropped as it should be ! 

Once there were a dozen cottages round the 
farm ; there are now two, and one of these is 
lived in by a " derelict." One labourer does all 
the work on the land. Some day perhaps 
England will wake up and see how well she could 
feed herself if she were properly managed. I 
know I would gladly take on a similar place if I 
294 



SOME OF THE FARMS 

were young ; the farming should be well done, and 
I would sit under a big red umbrella in the market- 
place in the nearest town and sell the produce 
myself! People might say what they liked. 
Neither the parson, squire, nor lawyer need call ; 
I do not want either; but I should make a com- 
fortable little weekly income, which would prevent 
me from having to apply, as I am sure I shall 
have to do before long, for an old age pension. 
If the mistress of the North Farm had done this 
I am sure she would have made a fortune, for 
she could have added to her beautiful butter and 
eggs, fat chickens and ducks and a store of honey. 
A long row of beehives stood in " the loo " under 
a south wall, and I have never forgotten the 
wonderful sound of the bees among the lime-trees 
in the summer. * ' They are in a regular ' charm, ' ' ' 
said the labourers when I noticed the noise : a 
sound, by the way, noticed long, long ago by 
Virgil.* Alas ! that those hives were decorated 
with crape when the farmer died. Of course the 
bees had to be told and the hives put into mourn- 
ing, else would they one and all have deserted 
the place. Even now crape is always put on the 
hives when a death takes place in the family. 
In the 'sixties the bees were solemnly told who 

* Hinc tibi, quae semper vicino ab limite sepes 
Hyblseis apibus florem depasta salicti, 
Saepe levi somnum suadebit inire susurro, 

Virgil, " Bucolica," Eel. i. 54-56. 
"On ye one side [or hand] a hedge planted along ye adjoining boundary, 
whereof ye sallow blossoms are ever eaten by Hyblaean bees, shall often 
woo you with its gentle humming to seek and find repose." 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

was dead, the oldest workman upon the place 
taking the task upon himself as a matter of course. 

There were in my time one or two cottages in 
the lane leading to the North Farm, which I am 
glad to say have disappeared, for in winter the 
water used to flow over the steps and into the 
one sitting-room itself. The old shepherd was 
doubled up with rheumatism, but flatly refused 
to move. He was near his " ship," as he called 
his sheep, and, moreover, had not only been born 
in the cottage, but his father and grandfather 
had been born there too. He was crippled with 
rheumatism, which he treated in a singular fashion 
by pouring " an egg-cup full of benzine into his 
hip-joints " when he went to bed. These are his 
own words, and I do not know how he managed 
to get the stuff to stay there. But he and his 
wife did not long survive the master ; their 
children, grown up and gone away, flatly refused 
to have anything whatever to do with farm work. 
No one would live in the cottage, with its one 
bedroom and a half-landing where the children 
had slept, and its one sitting-room, through which 
the water ran whenever the springs rose, and 
finally it fell into ruins ; and I do not think even a 
trace remains of the house, which for at least four 
generations held the humble toilers of the fields. 

I can see that lane as it appeared to me on a fine 
spring Sunday forty years ago as if it were yester- 
day ; we walking to church behind the " maidens," 
whose elaborately starched, worked, and distended 
296 



SOME OF THE FARMS 

petticoats caused " Little Auntie " many qualms, 
and ensured the wearers a lecture on the following 
day. Then the lane ran musical with the little 
stream, full of what we called sago pudding, and 
which was the embryo of many a frog. The 
primroses were thick in the hedges, the birds 
were singing rapturously, and presently past us 
lumbered tne 'bus, which the farmer always had 
out on Sundays. If wet it took us early to church 
and went back for the old folk ; if fine we walked 
and the old and crippled people drove, and we 
were generally passed by it half-way down the 
lane. "You'll be late," growled the farmer 
fiercely, his position as churchwarden making 
him very stern with us ; but we never were, though 
we met and talked with many a straggler; and 
many a bit of gossip did we exchange ere we 
obeyed the last rather snappish church bell and 
seated ourselves decorously in the appointed pew. 
" All, all are gone, the old familiar faces," not one 
of all those who worshipped with us being alive ! 
Well, they exist for me at any rate, a part of a 
life that has long since ceased to be ; and if they 
have only gone back into the earth from which 
they sprang, what matter ? The snowdrops still 
shine in the sun in the churchyard, other people 
sparsely fill the once overcrowded pews. " The 
old order changeth." If the new one be better 
time alone can say. Personally, part of my heart 
is buried with the dear old times we once had 
in the farms I once knew so very, very well. 

297 



CHAPTER XII 

ROUND THE COAST 

In all the years I had known our town before I 
was married I never realised how near we were 
to the sea until I had come to live in the place. 
No railway existed between us and the coast; 
and I most devoutly wish that none had ever been 
brought there to desecrate the silence and old- 
world peace of the delightful district. Even 
before I knew it, Mrs. Craik, better known to the 
reading world as the author of " John Halifax, 
Gentleman " had penetrated into the island and 
written more than one of her stories about it. 
" The Little Lychetts," a story long since for- 
gotten, I am afraid, told all about the quarries and 
the stone-workers, while he of whom I speak as the 
Master, figured in that and also in " Agatha's 
Husband," a book which even in these days of 
ours is still, I believe, occasionally read. I first 
made the acquaintance of Mrs . Craik in the country, 
but truly I never personally could get on with her. 
She was a " sweet " woman, with all the early 
Victorian virtues strongly developed. Nothing 
beyond the sanctity of the hearth appealed to her 
in the least, and she was a perfect survival of the 
298 



ROUND THE COAST 

days when a woman stayed at home and found in 
that home the one end and aim of her existence. 
I am not saying that she was wrong ; I am only 
saying that she did not appeal to me ; neither, at 
the same time, did I appeal to her. She was 
sentimental to her finger-tips, and I never could 
understand how she had forced herself to come 
out into the light of publicity and publish her 
many stories at all. I believe she did so from 
the noblest of motives ; her mother and she were 
penniless, and her father's debts had to be paid ; 
but she must have suffered tortures from the 
lionising she had to endure. Though naturally 
she lived in the days when a celebrity's steps 
were not dogged by the ubiquitous photographer, 
and when personal paragraphs did not make the 
life of any one in the least known to the public 
unendurable — or delightful, according to the 
manner in which one looks upon the matter I 
Even when I knew her she was very nice-looking, 
and I should think she had been a very pretty, 
round-faced, English-looking girl. She always 
dressed very quietly and soberly, and wore on 
her head a square of beautiful lace, brought 
together under the chin, where it was fastened by 
a pearl brooch. I never can understand even 
now why I did not like her, for so many people 
were her absolute slaves. She came to our town 
to visit the children of one of her old schoolfellows. 
The children had early been left orphans, and were 
under the care of the same governess who had 

299 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

taught their mother and Mrs. Craik, and the chil- 
dren and the authoress were mutually attached. 
" Aunt Mary," as the governess was termed, 
shared my feeling towards Mrs. Craik, but at the 
same time very much admired her, and helped 
her in every way she could to bring up the small 
foundling who took the place of the children she 
never had in the authoress's most capacious 
heart. Indeed, I never knew any one so capable 
of loving as was Mrs. Craik; and though she 
certainly did not like me ; she put up with me 
because she liked those belonging to me, and 
because she had made long expeditions among 
the cliffs with my father-in-law, to learn all about 
the quarries and to pick up some of the many 
superstitions indulged in by the women-folk in 
those parts. 

I have no doubt that the education insisted 
on by the Government nowadays has eradicated 
those superstitions, just as it has eradicated the 
beloved dialect wept over by Thomas Hardy and 
other denizens of the land. But forty years ago 
most people believed in charms of one kind or 
the other. If toothache were dreaded, the thing 
to do was to wear a small piece of paper in a silk 
bag round one's neck, the paper inscribed with 
the following elegant verse : 

The apostle Peter sat upon a Stwiin; 
Our Blessed Lord and Saviour He come along, 
And said, "Rise, Peter, and wear this for My seake, 
And you shall never more have the toothieache." 
300 



ROUND THE COAST 

One day Mrs. Craik came upon a small boy, seated 
out in the air on a stone repeating the doggerel ; 
while the tears ran down his cheeks, and he vainly 
endeavoured to believe his pain was cured. It 
had some effect, inasmuch as the lad was conveyed 
to the nearest doctor : country doctors extracted 
teeth in those days : and very soon was all right. 
Another infallible charm to be applied to any 
child suffering from whooping-cough, was a locket 
containing some hair out of the centre of the 
cross on a donkey's back. Indeed, the child 
need never have the cough at all if one took it 
as early as possible on a donkey to four cross- 
roads ; there one had to remove it from the 
animal's back, and pass it under the body of the 
beast four times, facing the four points of the 
compass consecutively. Indeed, one of our old 
tenants was quite cross with me because I 
declined to borrow her donkey for the purpose, 
and so make the children safe against one of the 
most tiresome and odious of all childish com- 
plaints. Mrs. Craik accepted the donkey's hair 
quite seriously. Of course she had no more faith 
in these charms than I had, but she was too good 
to laugh at the vain superstition, and so won the 
heart of the old woman at the inn. 

All the same Patty Bower became a great friend 
of mine, and gave me quite a beautiful old blue 
and white china pint mug, which I still possess. 
When she married all the beer mugs were alike 
in that public-house; before that date pewter 

301 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

cups were the fashion; and, indeed, the Master 
told me that when he was a lad no one possessed 
any china at all in the houses of the lower classes. 
Pewter was universally used. Now china is so 
cheap every one uses and smashes it gaily, and 
pewter adorns the shelves of the connoisseur, 
whose ancestors would have speedily relegated 
it to the kitchen without more ado. 

I do not know who has that inn now, but it 
had been in our time, in the hands of the same 
family for four generations. The old husband 
was extremely fond of birds, and, moreover, could 
paint them, and the inn kitchen possessed a settle 
decorated with his handiwork, of which he was 
very proud. I think Mrs. Craik fancied she had 
found a genius in him, but he declined to be 
exploited ; and she had to fall back on an unhappy 
little cripple, of whom she wrote as " the post- 
man's little daughter," and specimens of whose 
crude verses she had published on more than one 
occasion. Poor little creature ! this quite turned 
her head. She had always had yearnings above 
her station, and finally married a man who thought 
he had a mine of wealth in her brain. He really 
did believe in and worship her ; but she died in an 
endeavour to continue her race, and now she is 
quite forgotten. I think she was quite happy in 
the almshouse where she lived with her mother, 
teaching a few little children and weaving her 
trite little poems when they had gone home. 
She was not happy when ambition entered her 
302 



ROUND THE COAST 

brain, and it was as well that she died when she 
did. Village genius, especially crippled genius, 
can seldom bear the fierce light of day, and when 
it is not genius, but merely pleasant fancy, the 
materials for a tragedy are easily at hand. 

The coast when I knew it first was about as 
desolate and delightful a spot as can be found 
in England ; now, alas ! it is nothing of the kind, 
except in winter, when it is decidedly desolate, 
but the very reverse of delightful in any shape 
or form. I can see the little farmhouses nestling 
alone and solitarily in the hollows of the hills as 
I write ; here and there the blue smoke climbs 
up into the air ; here and there a desolate church- 
tower shows where once was a village teeming 
with life, where delightful country clerics lived 
and brought up and educated equally delightful 
large families of sons and daughters. Three — 
nay, four — of these churches are now under one 
man, the reverse of delightful, and the congre- 
gations are sparse and discontented. The rec- 
tories and vicarages are let to " casuals," who 
make summer residences of them, and where once 
the villagers could go for soup or beef all through 
the long wild winter no one lives ; and in conse- 
quence from October to May, and often longer, the 
whole place is silent and deserted indeed. Mud 
obstructs the roads, sea fogs climb along the 
valley, and the grim stones in the churchyard 
glisten in the damp ; glisten, that is to say, when 
they are not green with moss, which creeps all 

303 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

over, obliterates the lettering, and covers the 
names of those who once lived happily in the 
place that now knows them, and, indeed, no one 
else ; save in summer-time ; any more. 

The last blow has been given to the coast by 
the apparently imbecile removal of the delightful 
coastguard, who used always to be a feature. 
Their trim black cottages, roofed with stone, and 
with brilliantly white cobble-stoned yards, are to 
let, and in some cases, are let to enterprising firms 
in London, who, having sent down loads of furni- 
ture, let the houses as *' semi-detached seaside 
villas " to small clerks with large families, who 
desecrate the place during August, which, take it 
altogether, is one of the most unspeakable months 
by the sea, in the whole year. In one of the bays 
is the remembrance of a wicked attempt to make 
money that not more than a couple or three years 
ago was revived once more ; and only frustrated 
because there were yet those alive who recollected 
the failure of the first attempt, in which they and 
their parents had been reduced in some cases 
almost to beggary. In the cliffs and round about 
is to be found a most evil-smelling stuff called shale, 
which burns readily enough, but which emits 
while burning the most appalling odour that ever 
poisoned the countryside. The Romans found and 
used the stuff, bygone antiquarians suggested 
that they used it as money; but nowadays the 
so-called money is believed to be fragments from 
the vases turned out of the shale, or else may be 
304 



ROUND THE COAST 

primitive buttons. It has most certainly nothing 
to do with money; save that the shape of the 
pieces found about the cUffs suggests a coin. It 
certainly did cause money to flow like water 
many years ago ; and, as I remarked before, lost 
the hard-earned savings of many a worthy soul. 
The great dehdcle was before my time, and the 
factory that was to procure oil from the shale was 
opened in great state by Marshal Pelissier just 
after the Crimean War ; it was in ruins when I 
went to live in the town. After that date the 
idea was that shale should be burned instead of 
coal. A great building sprang up on the beautiful 
heath, and, indeed, is still there. The chimney is 
a landmark for miles round, sharing that honour 
with another tower with which Hardy's " Two 
on a Tower " is associated for all time, and which 
can be seen on a clear day from a great distance. 
When the factory was built, and a long row of 
cottages added, which were to contain the potters 
and their wives, who were to be brought down 
from Staffordshire ; it was found that the shale 
would not heat the kilns. It was cheaper to take 
the fine china clay to the pottery districts than to 
bring the coal down to the clay. So the shale was 
responsible for another failure, and the pottery 
declined on bad times. It was shut for years, 
to the secret j oy of many of the old inhabitants, 
who were not anxious to have the beautiful 
moorland desecrated by factories, and the town's 
morals corrupted by factory hands. Then some 
u 305 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

one said bricks and drain-pipes, and I believe an 
excellent business is done in these useful but 
most prosaic articles of commerce ! 

The last attempt to exploit the shale which I 
recollect personally was some time in the early 
'seventies, when coal was abnormally dear and 
when fires were things one did not have any 
oftener than one could. Then shale was tried 
once more ; the whole town reeked of it ; and my 
dear old doctor, who had, I think, some interest 
in pushing the sale, arrived in with a great lump 
in his pocket. " You must try it," he said, and 
despite my remonstrances he put it into my fire. 
At once the appalling odour filled the room, and 
next day the horrible steel grate from which I 
then suffered a good deal even on ordinary 
occasions was covered with a shining coating of 
oil which it took hours of really hard work to 
remove. This oil I believe some people still 
imagine can be used either for lighting or as a 
motive power ; all I can say is that I hope motor 
maniacs may be induced to try it. First they 
would be poisoned, and secondly their engines 
would become so clogged that they would either 
have to stop short, or else go at a pace that would 
give other people a chance to use the roads ! 

It is curious to note the difference now in the 
coast from what it used to be when sundry caves 
gave most excellent shelter for smugglers ; and 
when only about a dozen people at the most 
were to be found there even on the hottest summer 
306 



ROUND THE COAST 

day. It is far enough from the world at present 
to do pretty much as it likes, but I often wonder 
when the Medical Officer of Health will cease to be 
a local man, and, being appointed from London, 
can do his duty fearlessly and put a stop to 
matters that in the holiday months are getting 
above a joke. The houses put up for the shale 
workers consist of a kitchen and a couple of bed- 
rooms at most ; these are let to families. No water 
is laid on; there are no sanitary conveniences; 
and now the farmers let their fields to any one 
who likes to put up tents and indulge in the 
simple life, things may be seen, and have to be 
endured by the residents, which are far from 
pleasant. There are five miles of very bad road 
between this part of the coast and the nearest 
station. People often bring down tents, and come 
to the cottages without realising all it must mean ; 
they cannot get away without forfeiting their 
hard-earned holiday. Then the unspeakable, 
indescribable fascination of the place seizes them ; 
they see the exquisite hills and vales, they are 
close to the beautiful sea, they gallop in and out 
of the waves unchecked ; they return, in fact, to 
nature as they had never hoped to do, and they 
forget the discomforts and only recollect the 
pleasures. Then they confide in their friends ; 
each year brings more tents, more people. They 
had a mild epidemic during the summer of 1908 ; 
doubtless they will soon have a big one. Then 
the authorities will interfere, and the coast will 

307 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

be left alone in its quiet, restful beauty once 
more ! 

I knew the other side of the coast -line at first 
much better than the one sacred to the shale 
then, and desecrated now by the ubiquitous 
tripper; for every Friday for more than twelve 
years, we used to drive either through the valley, 
or up across the hills on our way to the little 
seaport where we had then a small and most 
picturesque brewery. It had, moreover, an old 
house and garden attached, and in the latter most 
delicious asparagus used to grow, while on the 
house grapes used to ripen : the small sweet- water 
grapes that one never sees nowadays. Another 
thing I do not think one sees nowadays either, is 
the door that opened straight from the master's 
room into his office ; our own garden door did 
that. The seaside brewery opened out of the 
dining-room, and here the master was always at 
his post. Occasionally he would be washed out 
of it, or roused in the middle of the night because 
the little brook outside had risen suddenly ; the 
office was afloat, the dining-room furniture making 
out to sea ; while, worst of all, the maltings were in 
danger, and all hands had to be summoned to save 
the most important harvest of the year. I was 
very fond of that Friday drive, for we used to stop 
en route at all our public-houses, and while my 
husband went in and collected rents and money : 
some of the old folk would come out and talk to 
me and hold the ponies, with which I could never 
308 



ROUND THE COAST 

bear to be left. I would sometimes go into the 
old out-of-the-way churches, now more or less 
restored, then all in a state of picturesque decay : 
and I am not at all sure that I did not prefer 
them in that state to their present far more 
correct and proper appearance ! I recollect, too, 
that behind some of the public-houses we used 
to grow great quantities of peaches ; that is to 
say, we gave the trees and superintended the 
culture, while a certain amount of the produce 
was kept for us. Our garden would not grow 
peaches, though it produced apricots and quan- 
tities of the most beautiful great golden plums 
that I have ever seen. The sea-port in our day 
was most primitive, and appeared literally to go 
to sleep from about the 1st of October to the 
1st of July. Some bold souls might come down 
about Easter, but there was no regular Easter 
exodus from the big cities then, and visitors were 
rare enough to be objects of interest to me when 
I came over on the usual Friday drive. 

The town I knew and loved has so entirely 
disappeared that it may be worth describing as 
it was when I knew it ; and I do not think any 
place in the world ever grew such wild-flowers 
as did that special district. We drove through 
groves of golden gorse, crowding primroses, 
violets, and cowslips. Later on in the year the 
hedges were festooned with wild roses ; foxgloves 
stood up proudly among the many ferns ; several 
orchids could be found ; and in the wide ditches 

309 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

now desecrated by the presence of hideous red 
villas, the Osmunda regalis grew in profusion. Not 
here and there as it did about the heath where 
we found the General, but in great clumps that 
were indeed most beautiful to behold. When 
we reached the shore I generally sat either in 
one of our houses, where I had luncheon ; or else 
at the end of the rough wooden structure that 
was called the pier, and where the occasional 
steamer called, and where coal and similar articles 
of commerce were unloaded. But the chief in- 
dustry of the place was stone. In those days it 
was roughed into shape at the quarries, and 
worked or dressed on " bankers " along the shore, 
and the eternal chip, chip, chip of the chisel 
mingled with the sound of the sea in a most weird 
manner. When the chipping process was over 
the stone was packed into carts, and the horses 
used to go out into the sea as far as they could 
with their loads. Then the stone was put into 
flat barges, which were piloted out to small 
coasting- vessels in the bay, and taken up either to 
Portsmouth or else to London itself : a cumbrous 
method of proceeding; but a most picturesque 
one. The quarriers are even to this day a most 
old-world and picturesque race of men. Governed 
by their own laws and incorporated under their 
own charter, the quarriers can only work in the 
quarries if they are freemen, the sons of freemen, 
or have married the daughters of freemen ; and 
I recollect an absurd bloodthirsty quarrel between 
310 



ROUND THE COAST 

the quarriers on one hand and a newcomer in the 
island on the other. He had bought some land, 
and proceeded to close the quarries because he 
wished to have the place to himself and to be 
able to breed game and shoot exactly where he 
pleased. He had to give way about the quarries, 
and they are worked to this day by the descen- 
dants of the men who waged that successful fight. 
At one time the quarriers had the privilege of 
coming down from the quarries straight to the 
sea ; I think on Easter Monday ; and kissing every 
woman they met. Civilisation and the advent of 
the policeman have put an end to that custom, 
but still they meet on Easter Monday at the town 
where the old charter used to be kept. Here 
the new freemen " take up their freedom " and 
keep open their right of way to the water by 
kicking a football from the top of the Castle Hill 
to the quay, where nowadays the clay is shipped 
on its outward journey towards Staffordshire. 
A pound of pepper had to be paid as quit-rent 
to the lord of the manor, who safeguarded yet 
other rights he had, by receiving a pepper-corn 
as rent from one of his tenants, who had to bring 
it himself to the manor accompanied by a one- 
eyed dog ! When this unfortunate beast could 
not be found, a compromise was effected by tying 
a handkerchief over the eye of an ordinary dog ; 
he could then only see out of one eye, and therefore 
answered enough to the description of a one-eyed 
dog for the purpose; at any rate in these very 

311 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

prosaic days of ours ; which, by the way, are so 
prosaic that I daresay the one-eyed dog tradition 
has been given up, and the lord of the manor 
contents himself with the pepper-corn. I wonder 
why he had that pound of pepper as well as the 
pepper-corn ? It seems a curious article to present 
to any one even as a quit-rent. I believe at one 
time the whole of London was paved from that 
district, just as many of the finest cathedrals have 
specimens of the local marble; but the trade is 
" not what it was " ; and at any rate one can sit 
on the shore nowadays, and know nothing at all 
about what was once the raison d'etre of the 
little place. 

On one exquisite winter day I saw a great ship 
go ashore under the cliffs, and watched it beat in 
agony, as it were, against the rocks ; but fortu- 
nately there was no wind, the sea was calm, tugs 
came out from Poole, and in time the ship was 
hauled out into the open sea, and went on its way. 
More fortunate than many another ship on the 
coast ; while during one awful " night of weather " 
one of our men who lived : and, indeed, yet lives : 
in one of the small white houses close to the beach 
was roused by a terrific noise, and saw the bow- 
sprit of a ship coming right in at his window. As 
the skipper and crew were Norwegian, and, more- 
over, were armed with knives, David* thought he 

* Since this was in type, David died quite suddenly. His grandfather, 
father and himself were faithful servants for three generations to our 
family : and with him expires a type of man, that the present generation 
will never know. 
312 



ROUND THE COAST 

had an appalling nightmare ; but he and his wife 
rose to the occasion, admitted the drenched and 
starving creatures to his house-place, and put the 
skipper's wife to sleep in the warm bed he and 
his wife had just vacated. Fortunately a back- 
wave had caused the ship to retreat into the bay 
once more, and the window could be barred up. 
The skipper's wife's life was saved, and in return 
she gave David's wife some beautiful old Nor- 
wegian jewellery; which I trust is still in the 
family ; as a reminder of that awful night. The 
greatest enemy of the place is the east wind that 
blows straight into the bay and comes laden with 
fog and mist. I have known weeks of fog there 
in the winter, as indeed I have at other places, 
but it is high treason to say so. The inhabitants 
care nothing, naturally, for the picturesque side 
of the place ; their cry is for visitors, more visitors, 
and the cliffs are crowned with hideous houses, 
and the dear, tiny little old-world spot has died 
a horrid death. I wish I could sketch it as it 
used to be, with its grey beach and its grey 
bankers, its tiny, winding, narrow High Street, 
down which we drove with dread lest we should 
meet one of the great stone waggons before we 
reached the wide place where we could pass 
safely. If we did, either we or the waggon had 
to be backed, for we certainly could not pass, and 
if this occurred in a regular winter storm, with 
the rain pouring and a high south-westerly wind 
raging, it was anything but a happy adventure. 

313 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

Neither did we care to meet the coach which was 
then the only means of reaching the nearest rail- 
way. Ten miles of very rough road had to be 
traversed in a vehicle that I for one always 
expected to find in pieces by the side of the road ; 
and it was, moreover, drawn by four most horrible 
screws of horses, all with broken knees, while the 
harness was principally rope, and always required 
repairs during the hazardous journey. The driver 
was a regular character, and though in later years 
he was fined over and over again for cruelty to 
animals, he never meant to be cruel : I am sure 
of that. He had to buy old horses ; he had to 
catch trains, for he was her Majesty's mail-coach 
driver; and he never held malice against those 
that fined him ; his chaff was repeated from 
mouth to mouth ; and when he died his funeral 
was attended by every one who could go for miles 
round. We always met him twice, once going 
out, once returning, on our drive ; and he invari- 
ably greeted us in the most jovial manner, albeit I 
believe I got him his first fine ; I could not stand 
the look of his old screws, and the inspector 
pounced down, and there was distinctly a rumpus 
in the place. It could not have been a pleasant 
adventure to drive the coach twice a day all 
weathers, but only the great snow of January 
1881 ever detained the mails ; then for ten 
days no one could reach that seaport. The 
howling winter wind made approach by sea 
impossible, and both the roads were so deep 
314 



ROUND THE COAST 

in snow that they were absolutely impassable. 
I shall never forget that January storm the 
longest day I live, for amongst other things 
it gave me my first impulse to write of what 
I saw. 

We had shut up the house rather earlier than 
usual the evening of the storm, because the wind 
had become terrible, and I am always glad to 
shut out bad weather. When my husband came 
in from the brewery he said it was snowing; 
indeed it was ! Before we went to bed the wind 
drove it under the doors and windows in so extra- 
ordinary a manner that a miniature snowstorm 
was happening in the house; and all through 
the wide hall snow was drifting to such an extent 
that we got all the bags and rough cloths we 
could, and stuffed them under the doors and 
round the windows, and wondered what we should 
find the next morning. 

It was most creepy to wake to complete 
silence and almost complete darkness. As a 
rule, sounds from the brewery or the feet of the 
brewery horses awoke me early enough ; but it 
was eight before I roused, and then I could not 
see without a light. Later on I went to the win- 
dow ; it was snowing hard, hard ; and though 
the wind had ceased all I could gather was that 
an even plain of snow, apparently about four 
feet high, lay in front of us. The garden paths 
were level with the top of the hedges, the snow 
obscured the sitting-room windows, and the maids 

315 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

told me they had to be dug out before the back 
door could be opened. The result in the town 
for days was most abnormal, for we were as much 
in prison as if we had been besieged. The two 
platforms at our very small station were level; 
one could walk from one to the other on the snow ; 
the hedges were level ; and where the snow had 
drifted it was such a height that I should be 
afraid to chronicle it. We were fortunately 
situated as regards food, as we were the centre of 
a large distributing area, and had the benefit of 
the provisions that should have gone out to the 
villages ; but in some of the scattered farms and 
smaller places the people came very near star- 
vation. Easy transit had made them forget the 
days when the lack of proper roads made store- 
cupboards imperative, and I believe the farmers' 
wives were much '' put to " to feed their house- 
holds of children and labourers ; while the stock 
perished and the shepherds had a simply awful 
time with the lambs. We had only a couple of 
days without letters or newspapers, but those 
were quite enough for us. At the same time it 
was most amusing to see grave masters, and heads 
of families disporting themselves in the snow. 
They called it clearing the streets, but they made 
splendid snowmen, not only in the centre of the 
town, but wherever they thought a statue might 
improve the appearance of the place ; whilst 
some of them did not despise games of snow- 
balling. Business was absolutely at a standstill, 
316 



ROUND THE COAST 

and never before nor since have I experienced 
such a curious time. At last accounts from the 
coast and the valley began to straggle in. It 
was necessary for our enemy the lawyer to 
communicate with one of his friends. He offered 
large bribes to two men to carry a letter. For- 
tunately for us, they could not get through, but 
they recounted such a tale of misery, that every 
able-bodied man for miles round was turned out 
on the roads ; and under the generalship of one of 
our county folk, the roads were cleared to some 
extent, and communication between us and the 
coast was once more made possible. 

Shall I ever forget the truly awful drive we had 
the first day we were able to reach the seaport ? 
At first it was all right. A good strong horse 
took the dog-cart along fast enough over the 
hard roads ; then we discovered we could only 
take the higher road, the valley being still blocked ; 
and the horse climbed the awful hills and slipped 
hither and thither until we were well-nigh shaken 
to death. The only things that enjoyed that 
drive were our three beloved dogs ; they played 
about in the snow as if they were mad. They 
rolled in it, bit at it, and threw it at each other, 
just as if they too desired to play at snow-balling. 
Sometimes they disappeared altogether, and, re- 
membering the old quarries, and how in the snow 
one man had fallen in one of them and been only 
able to crawl out to die, I trembled for the dogs. 
But after driving for miles between hills of snow 

317 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

we got down to the sea, and found the town 
almost in a state of coma. When we turned our 
faces to go home we felt that a change was coming, 
and we made haste. Fortunately we got back 
before the wind really changed, for presently I 
heard drip, drip, drip from the roof, then a heavy 
slide along it ; the snow began to melt, and it 
went even quicker than it had come. Next day 
meadows, road, garden, were all a swamp ; all 
were overrun by the river; and we saw weird 
objects being dashed along that made us shudder. 
I do not think anything worse than a stray 
pig or a bundle of hay came down; but if any 
one wants to have a horrible sensation, let him 
stand on a bridge and watch a flood pass quickly 
under it. There is nothing one cannot see 
if one is gifted with the smallest amount of 
imagination ! 

But before the snow went I saw that the London 
newspapers had not the least account of what the 
storm had meant in the country, and it struck 
me that perhaps one of them would care to have 
an idea. I sat down to my desk and wrote just 
as if I had been writing to " the girls." We then 
took in and loved the Daily News. I knew Sir 
John Robinson and Mr. Parkinson, and they 
knew me, and I felt that at any rate I should have 
my account returned if it were stupid. Judge 
of my joy when in the next day's paper but one 
my article appeared ! Not only was it in print, 
but I received a kind, very kind letter from Mr. 
318 



ROUND THE COAST 

Robinson, as he was then, and an intimation that 
I might send him other similar articles when the 
spirit moved me. Sir John Robinson is dead, 
and I cannot tell him now what his letter did for 
me, but I set to work and sent him other articles 
and then, growing bolder, despatched others fur- 
ther afield to the Pall Mall Gazette^ from whence 
I used to get very peppery letters from the 
present Lord Morley of Blackburn, who abused 
me roundly for my handwriting, called me 
" Dear Sir," and always ended up with a certain 
amount of grudging praise. The greatest joy 
I had was from a letter sent through the paper 
from Professor Newton asking me to communi- 
cate with him. I did so, and recalled our visits 
down the harbour together. He then gave me 
the names of other places to write about, and 
never ceased to be a kind friend. 

Somehow I never told any one in the neighbour- 
hood about my writing; it left me a much freer 
hand, and caused much speculation as to the 
writer, which gave me much amusement, espe- 
cially as a man was always looked for, and my 
dear friend " Idstone " was more than once 
suspected of one or two of the political skits I 
wrote. But the fact that I could write came to 
me as a real blessing. We were then in the thick 
of a most troublous time, and as it is almost a 
unique experience I will describe what happened 
anon. But it is astonishing how the mere fact of 
having to look out for subjects opened my eyes. 

319 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

We had a beautiful garden, now spoiled for ever ; 
for our field, where once the old Castle used to 
stand, is to be built over, and the exquisite 
rhododendrons and Ghent azalea hedge that once 
sheltered us from the south-west wind have long 
since disappeared, " to open out the view," but 
to let in the weather. The apple-trees where 
the mistletoe grew are gone; so are the arbutus 
trees ; and, in fact, it is no longer " the garden that 
I loved." Even the mulberry tree the last time 
I saw it was hung like a malefactor in chains 
because the branches interfered with some lawn 
game that was then the vogue. Only my lovely 
magnolia tree was the same ; it held fifty large 
white cups of perfume the last year I was living 
there ; and the fly-catcher used to put his nest 
there year by year, on a ledge close by my window. 
The yew is gone in which the chaffinch always 
built its neatly made apple-blossom-trimmed nest, 
and I do not think many birds come now as they 
used to year after year to be fed. Our cat-tree 
has also gone; there at one time thirteen cats 
used to lie out on the broad branches of a cedar, 
the top branch was sacred to the oldest cat, who 
boxed the ears of any cat who dared to encroach 
on his territory. But our cats were so often 
killed in the machinery of the brewery that it was 
heart-breaking to have them. They went to 
hunt for rats and mice, and fell into the engine ; 
but as we naturally expected to hear they were 
all drowned in the beer, we gave up the cats ; and 
320 



ROUND THE COAST 

only kept one or two to keep down the mice, 
that were dreadful, owing to our proximity to 
one of the malt-houses. From that delightful 
garden I first drew inspiration; afterwards I 
wrote about the brewery and the malt-houses, 
where we used to bake our potatoes on Sunday 
evenings, because the fire there had always to 
be kept alight, and in our time late Sunday 
cooking was never allowed in the house. Outside 
the malt-house we had a splendid bed of lilies of 
the valley. I can never smell lilies without 
smelling the malt-house too. But that was 
spoiled by our gardener. He thought they grew 
too closely, and he divided the plants. Nothing 
does a lily of the valley resent so much as being 
disturbed, and as long as I was there no flowers 
came up; and I believe in all the twenty-four 
years that have gone since I left there have been 
no more lilies in that bed ! 

From writing about the country, birds and 
beasts and animals generally, I began to love 
and understand it. Gardening, that I had not 
touched since Aunt Lizzie used to allow me to 
hold the verbena pegs, appealed to me greatly, 
and my roots were well in and had begun to 
spread, when heigh, presto ! up they had to come ; 
and they have never been firmly attached to any 
place ; except London, where I was born ; from 
that day to this ! 



321 



CHAPTER XIII 

ALARUMS AND EXCURSIONS 

In the year 1773 a young Scottish minister came 
south, and in the town of Wimborne Minster 
was put in charge of a small Dissenting chapel, 
where to this day a tablet hangs on the wall and 
commemorates his brief and valiant career in 
that charming place. He was only twenty-seven 
when he died, and he left a widow, the daughter 
of a local brewer, and two small sons. We do 
not really know her history or where she lived, 
what she was like, or what she said or did ; but 
having friends in the place, which was, indeed, 
her native one, she remained on there, visiting 
at the Manse, where she had been mistress ; and 
being a friend to the new minister and his delicate 
wife. One of the boys followed his father quickly 
to the grave ; the other grew up, and in the year 
1802 founded the tiny brewery which was the 
first in the family, as the one at present is, I 
devoutly hope, the very last. The minister lost 
his wife, and in due time he married the widow 
of his predecessor, left Wimborne, and went to 
322 



ALARUMS AND EXCURSIONS 

reside at what was called the St. Peter Street 
Chapel House, in the Savoy, London. His name 
was Duncan, and Pitt the Minister gave him a 
degree ; that of D.D., because when in straits for 
money Mr. Duncan suggested to him the tax on 
horses, and the suggestion was of vast service to 
the Government. Dr. and Mrs. Duncan had 
sons : I wish I could trace them or their de- 
scendants ; they were sailors, and we always held 
the belief that Dr. Duncan was related to the 
admiral whose hideous monument is in St. Paul's, 
and whose life is told in all the stories of the 
British Navy. When Mrs. Duncan became a 
widow for the second time she returned to the 
home of her eldest son, and lived at the brewery- 
house, where she died in 1821. But no one knows 
where she is buried, and no one has any record 
of her last resting-place. It is always very eerie 
to me to think of those once- living men and 
women whose lives are responsible for the lives 
around us, but of whose personality there is 
not the smallest remaining trace. The tablet on 
the wall in the Wimborne Chapel; gravestones 
inserted into the wall of a chapel playground; 
a vast and hideous tomb in another burying- 
ground, represent the first three well-known 
generations of the family, who for about a hundred 
and fifty years lived in the one county, and now 
are known there no more. There must be some- 
thing in the blood that makes for change, for 
though it is a small family and there are few of 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

the name ; it is difficult to trace it from the 
Scottish days, until the young minister came 
south; and, bearing the name of a well-known 
rake and gambler of the days of King Charles II., 
showed no signs of his ancestor, and lived his 
quiet, short life in the odour of sanctity ; doing 
his very, very best for those committed to his 
charge. 

The little brewery was at first a most primitive 
place ; the house was tiny, and the malt-house and 
brewery were almost under the same roof. An 
old horse went round and round and ground the 
malt and did the work a machine is supposed 
to do now ; and all was very well managed, and 
all under the master's eye. He died before he 
was fifty, and left two sons and two daughters ; 
one of the sons was to manage the brewery, and 
did so so well that before he married he had 
portioned his sisters and educated his half-brother, 
who was a doctor. And when he himself married 
he still kept his step-mother, a dour, narrow- 
minded, hard woman, who terrified his gentle, 
pretty wife, and terrorised the children with her 
awful stories of hell and the devil. But when the 
children began to come the brewery was found to 
be too small. A larger brewery was on the market 
in the town, and my father-in-law took that over, 
and the tiny house of his father was handed on 
to the head clerk, who in my earliest days still 
lived there. And as his daughter taught my 
small cousins I used to go to the house with her, 
324 



ALARUMS AND EXCURSIONS 

and little dreamed that I was in the place where 
my future husband first saw the light. 

Little Miss Tullidge was quite the most senti- 
mental person I have ever met, and to me, aged 
about twelve, she used to confide her love-affairs. 
I principally remember she adored sundry " sea- 
captains " : she never called them anything else : 
and that I was generally asked to walk home 
with her after school hours to see some of their 
numerous gifts. I remember one was an ostrich 
egg, for which she had made a net, and in which 
it hung in the window. Others were clumps of 
red and white coral under glass shades. Sundry 
weird shells also adorned her mantelpiece ; and 
in the narrow passage she called the hall she 
used to hang a long strip of sea-weed. The " sea- 
captain " who was in favour at the moment 
always brought her a fresh piece every voyage, 
and she had an idea, not only that it foretold the 
weather: which, of course, seaweed does in a 
measure : but that, according to whether it was 
fresh or dry, so was the " sea-captain's " health. 
" Dry " meaning that he was ill, " fresh " that he 
was blooming, and on the point of returning to 
claim her as his own. I never saw Mr. Tullidge, 
who was, I believe, an excellent clerk ; neither do I 
know what became of Miss Tullidge, but later on 
in life I found out that the " sea-captains " were 
myths as far as she was concerned. The gifts 
came from Southampton, and were made to her 
father when he went there on brewery business, 

325 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

for many of the publicans were either old sailors 
or had many sailor customers, and many a curious 
offering has been made me. The last one was a 
marmoset monkey, but it had to live in the 
brewery. I am not fond of monkeys, and if I 
recollect rightly the poor little creature soon pined 
and died. Miss Tullidge's gifts included a parrot, 
but as his language was terrible, so she said, he 
was always kept covered during my visits, and 
I only knew he was there by hearing him move 
uneasily on his perch and groan softly to himself ; 
while I sat and listened to her open-mouthed, 
and wondered if I too should live to be worshipped 
by such wonderful creatures as " sea-captains " 
must surely be ! 

I recollect quite well the look both of Miss 
Tullidge and the room in which we sat, and the 
tea-table at which she presided with much grace. 
She always poured out the tea very high up, 
and when she took her cup, her little finger was 
curled outwards in a manner that denoted how 
extremely genteel she was. There was a work- 
table in the window with a green knitted mat on it, 
and here stood one of the clumps of coral ; while 
in another corner was a stupendous set of chessmen 
in carved ivory. These also lived under a glass 
shade, and took her, as she explained, an hour 
every Saturday afternoon to dust and replace. The 
house was very low, but had a good many rooms in 
it, and afterwards it was turned into two cottages, 
in which state it remains until this very day. 
326 



ALARUMS AND EXCURSIONS 

The bigger brewery came into the family by 
the misfortune of the first owner : he was getting 
on very well when he suddenly thought he would 
build himself a big house to replace one which 
was burned down. He did so, much as the 
Irishman did who spent all his money to get a 
purse to keep it in ; and found when it was built 
that he could not afford to live in it. He came 
to grief, helped on by the lawyer who afterwards 
got his claws into us ; and my father-in-law, having 
a most opportune legacy, took over the brewery 
and the house, planted my dearly-loved mulberry 
tree, and proceeded to found a family there as 
fast as he possibly could. I wish it were possible 
to draw him as he really was, for had he been 
given a fair chance in the world he would have 
been a remarkable man. He could quell a riot 
with a word, and could speak to his men in a way 
that I for one envied him, for the most rebellious 
one was reduced to order in a moment; and as 
he was absolutely just, they overlooked his other 
faults and loved him really until the end. But 
he lived in the wrong century. In his days free 
living and hard drinking were the fashion : he 
ought to have married a strong-willed woman, 
who kept him, as well as his house, in order. 
But the pretty, fragile creature who was his wife 
was no match for him. She cried over his 
delinquencies ; prayed for him when she most 
certainly ought to have boxed his ears ; and, 
while she gathered her children close to her like 

327 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

a frightened hen, only brooded over them in a 
vain attempt to shield them from harm, instead 
of making common cause with them, and getting 
them to help her against the man who, had he 
been properly handled, would have made a 
name in the world. 

It used to be one of my pet, rather fearsome day- 
dreams, when I was first married, to ponder over 
and over those terrible times. The boy, who 
always bore on his shoulders the troubles of the 
family, used to dread his father's return from his 
long, cold journeys round the tenants, and did his 
best to keep his parents apart ; and the whole life 
in the house was so tragic that I could hardly 
endure to hear of it ; though now I understand 
it better and see how it could have been avoided 
in a different place and age. 

Then difficulties, of course, began: the legacy 
which seemed so enormous, and it was not a 
small one : did not serve for all that was required. 
Great tuns were put in the brewery to hold the 
strong beer, brewed one October and broached 
the next, which was then the fashion ; and engines 
replaced the horse and manual power. Money 
had to be borrowed, bills met, and the thousand 
and one worries inseparable from any commercial 
career commenced; and at the age of fourteen 
my husband was taken from school, and put into 
a collar that has never yet been taken off his 
shoulders, and which every year we live bids fair 
to be a heavier weight. 
328 



ALARUMS AND EXCURSIONS 

I want to write very calmly, if I can, all about 
the brewery. I hear how we are reviled by the 
teetotal party, how rich we are, how we drug 
our beer, how we oppress our tenants, and how 
we live on the sins and sorrows of one-half : nay, 
three-quarters : of the world. I think if the 
revilers of our trade really understood it, they 
would not talk the nonsense they undoubtedly do. 
Some brewers, say four or five at most, are very 
rich men ; but they earned their money by making 
a first-class article, and they kept it by finally 
retiring before the evil days came that are now 
enveloping "the trade" as with some dark cloud. 
The tenants oppress the brewers, not the brewers 
the tenants ; the justices always lean towards 
them, and not towards the owners of the house ; 
and if, as I believe, great harm has been done to 
the trade by the foolish manner in which public- 
houses were bought at an inflated price. Heaven 
knows the trade has paid for the mistake. For 
it will be a wonder if men who have worked all 
their lives in the best way they can, do not end 
either in the workhouse, or on the Embankment. 
Personally I prefer the Embankment, for the end 
would come quicker then than in any other place ! 

But to return to our own story. When my 
father-in-law found that he could no longer 
manage his own business he agreed to hand it 
over to his two sons, and he retired on an annuity 
to a charming house and garden in another part 
of the town, and we inhabited the brewery house. 

329 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

At first it seemed so large that we shut off one 
wing with a green baize door, but that had soon 
to come down. The house, though large, was the 
most inconvenient one I ever saw, and all the 
twelve years I lived there I never made it either 
pretty or nice. When I married, furniture had 
not evolved itself out of the mid- Victorian 
terrors. In the drawing-room was a white paper 
with a gold star, and the paint was grained to 
resemble bird's-eye maple; the furniture was a 
"suite" of green rep striped with red; and the 
dining-room was worse : it was painted sea-green, 
and grained as regards the woodwork dark 
brown ; while we were left the old heavy furniture. 
Two awful bookcases, one each side the fireplace, 
were filled with Chambers' books in mottled 
covers, and many volumes of Dissenting sermons ; 
the sideboard, table, and chairs were monumental, 
the curtains red woollen damask, and the carpet : 
which had once cost more than a hundred 
pounds and was occasionally shaved, so thick 
had it been: had had its last shaving for us, 
though I know where a piece still lies in front 
of a hearth, and that carpet was first bought in 
the year 1842 ! Only think of what that means 
as regards its wearing powers. There were 
many nice bits of Chippendale and Sheraton 
about the house ; alas ! I thought them all 
lumber. Some very good chairs were in the 
kitchen, while there was more than one "tall- 
boy" and great escritoire that nowadays would 
330 



ALARUMS AND EXCURSIONS 

be priceless, but which I was very glad to get rid 
of for something more modern and less cumber- 
some to move. 

The bride of to-day would scorn the bedroom 
I had ; yet I have never had such a comfortable 
one since. We had beautiful cupboards in the 
house, and one vast, enormous mahogany ward- 
robe lined with cedar. When we left and could 
not fit it into any future house, we could only 
get about eight pounds for it; yet it cost quite 
a hundred and twenty, and held all my trousseau, 
which was anything but a small one. My first 
dressing-table was made out of a child's cot, a 
heavy wooden crib which closed over and held 
all surplus blankets ; this was put into a pink 
lining skirt with white muslin over ; and besides 
this I had a vast oak chest of drawers, a sofa, 
the bed trimmed with hideous grey and red 
woollen damask, a couple of chairs, and that is all. 
Yet if these things are extant anywhere and 
could speak they could tell the whole story of 
my life as far as that house was concerned ; as 
they cannot, and, indeed, may all be firewood, let 
me get on with it while I may. 

It is not pleasant to " write oneself down an 
ass," as Shakespeare says, but it must be done. 
No one had a better chance than we had ; no 
one has spent and enjoyed more money ; no one 
has ever made more foolish mistakes or taken 
so many wrong turnings as we have, and as the 
recital may help others I will set them forth as 

331 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

shortly as I can. I came to my new life without 
the smallest conception of what business meant, 
what country life was, or what one should and 
should not do. I was quite certain that no one 
was as clever as my father, no one as good, no 
one as great. We had never considered for one 
instant that we were not the equals of any 
educated person in the world, and, indeed, to this 
day I still hold the same opinion about educated 
folk. I must have been detestable to many of 
those with whom I had to deal, and to none could 
I have made myself more detested than to my 
brother-in-law's wife. If she be alive and reads 
these words, let her know how sorry I am ! All 
the same she was a trial to me. I had hated 
the engagement and loathed the marriage ; her 
people were not in the least as were mine ; and 
though now I recognise how much there was in 
her, and how soon she advanced with the times, 
I could not see anything then save her parade 
of riches, her ridiculous dress and furniture, and 
her tiresome ways. Now I know my furniture 
was quite as ridiculous; and if my dress was 
quieter I had my mother to thank. I had had 
advantages she had not had, and I ought to have 
waited and " behaved " and not done every 
single thing I could to make her life unendur- 
able and myself unkind and hateful. If I sinned : 
which I honestly confess I did: I have suffered, 
for she first set the machinery in motion that 
almost ruined us, and so she got back more, much 
332 



ALARUMS AND EXCURSIONS 

more, than I ever gave ! When we were married 
the deed of partnership was drawn up by the 
same lawyer for both brothers, who, moreover, 
made the wills, that were both identical and both 
part and parcel of the partnership deed. Of 
course wiser folk than we were would have had 
separate advice. My father never was a business 
man ; he never gave me a shilling from the day 
of my marriage to the present day : and as he 
nothing to settle, all he did in the matter 
was to see a small insurance was settled on me ; 
he being a trustee, which said trusteeship he 
got out of as soon as ever he could. It would 
be wearisome and useless to tell of the many silly 
quarrels that occurred ; but the upshot of all was 
that when the brother died, suddenly almost, he 
was found to have altered his will, despite the 
written undertaking not to do so ; and this gave 
his wife powers that made life from day to day 
nothing save the most hideous nightmare. We 
never could tell what mine would be sprung 
upon us ; our tenants were upset and interfered 
with; and finally, after winning an action that 
almost ruined us : for though we were given costs 
and damages the man had not a red cent to pay 
us with : we gave her the choice of three courses. 
Either we should buy the brewery; sell it as a 
going concern ; or else she should buy it and 
do with it as she would. She chose the latter, 
and in time she too had to sell it and go away. 
If we suffered, so did she, and I really cannot say 

333 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

which deserved it most of the two, she or I. 
The worst feature in the whole thing was that, 
owing to wrong advice, we gave up possession 
of the place before the valuation was over and 
before we had our money, and for four solid 
years we were kept out of it and moreover never 
received one penny of interest. He who gave 
us the advice is long since dead. He was a good, 
kind and generous friend, and without his help 
we must have starved. All the same he was at 
the bottom of that great loss, and I only hope he 
does not know all that came from following his 
advice in the matter. 

It is a thousand pities that country breweries 
such as ours was are ceasing to exist, for they 
can never be replaced by the large companies 
that are the death and destruction to all real 
good feeling between master and man in the 
present day. Just before my father-in-law closed 
his small brewery and took over " Townsend's " 
there were three breweries and one public-house 
which brewed its own ale in the town, and now 
there is not one. Our old brewery is turned into 
a store, as are the others ; and one large firm of 
brewers alone, sends whatever it likes to the 
public-houses for miles and miles around. There 
is no healthy competition between the brewers as 
to who shall brew the best beer ; no men live 
out of the breweries; our staff is replaced by a 
clerk or two, the engines are quiet, and the whole 
place looks like a city of the dead. Gladly, oh, 
334 



ALARUMS AND EXCURSIONS 

how gladly would I return to the old place, start 
the engines, and live over again the strenuous 
life that was much better than the harassment 
of a company ; where the men scarcely know their 
directors by sight and where the clerks are all 
too often mere names ! 

It is amusing to recollect, too, some of the 
old experiments of past days, though one or two 
of them bade fair to be rather costly. The taste 
of the public was changing even in the 'seventies, 
and a much lighter beer was urgently asked for. 
We had hankerings after lager beer, though the 
storage and the requisite ice made that impossible. 
Experiments were made in raw grain, one of 
which resulted in the manufacture of a most 
superior rice pudding, which very nearly stopped 
the machinery entirely for the rest of its life. 
Dr. Graham, our consulting chemist, had come 
down on one of his visits to us : visits eagerly 
looked forward to, for he was always ready and 
anxious to tell us of some new thing : and under 
his auspices rice was to be tried instead of barley 
in the usual way. I thought there was a great 
deal of anxiety shown in the matter, and after 
dinner both the Doctor and my husband dis- 
appeared into the brewery, and I was told on no 
account either to sit up myself or keep any one up. 
So I went to bed, and, as usual in those days, 
went to sleep at once. I awoke about three. 
I was still alone, and so I got up and looked out 
at the brewery, and could see no lights there. 

335 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

I of course thought of all sorts of things. Surely an 
accident had happened. I looked out of my room ; 
Dr. Graham's door was wide open, so he had not 
come in ; at any rate there were two of them ; 
they could not both be killed or incapacitated; 
and I retired once more; and just at daybreak 
my husband came in for a few minutes. Instead 
of the wretched stuff behaving as it ought, it had 
refused to become beer ; it had clogged the 
engines, the men had had to be summoned to 
shovel it away, the Excise had to be notified so 
as to allow a rebate, and finally it was sent up 
to the farm. I think the intention was to put 
it on the land, but the zealous bailiff fed the cows 
with it, with the most disastrous effects. They 
ate it greedily, it almost blew them up, and 
several of the very best of our pet herd fell 
victims to our scientific attempts to brew. 

I do not believe any one ever worked, day in, 
day out, as my husband did as a young man, 
and does even now, when the times are harder 
than they ever were and brewers : the rich, 
licentious brewers of the halfpenny Press : are 
hard put to to keep a roof over their heads ; and 
of course the present-day work is neither as 
pleasant nor congenial, in a measure, as it used to 
be. In the country it meant knowing every 
tenant, every man, and all connected with them ; 
and the very drives we took together from public- 
house to public-house to collect money were 
delightful, even if the public-houses themselves 
33^ 



ALARUMS AND EXCURSIONS 

were not always abodes of bliss. All the same 
they were very different from London houses or 
the houses near London ; the tenants had been 
tenants sometimes for the three generations, 
the houses were well kept, and we rarely, if ever, 
had the unspeakable trouble that one has with 
tenants in these days of tinkering with the 
Licensing Act, until neither owner nor tenant 
knows where he is. 

We had one good and kind friend in a stalwart 
teetotaler, who often used to have temperance 
meetings, where the intemperance of the language 
used gave him as much pain as it did me amuse- 
ment. I have heard it stated at one of these 
that a sovereign's worth of beer cost a penny to 
make, and that the wine manufactured by our 
Lord at the wedding supper was not fermented, 
and so was not wine at all. I recollect that Mr. 
M — came up to me at this meeting and asked 
me if I did not feel like Daniel in the den of lions, 
and that I replied that I did, more especially as 
the lions were quite powerless to hurt me. I 
also told him how foolish his lecturer was, and he 
agreed with me ; for surely there is quite enough 
truth to be told about the evils of intemperance 
without uttering ridiculous untruths similar to 
those stated above. I only wish one could get 
a sovereign for what costs the brewer one penny ; 
but alas! if one gets a penny out of a sovereign now- 
adays one is a singularly lucky individual indeed ! 

People are looking about for the causes of 
Y 337 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

depression first and then for the great amount 
of unemployment, and I am bold enough to state 
that both are due, the first in a measure ; the 
latter altogether ; to the manner in which small 
businesses have been amalgamated, and people 
have made haste to get rich by swallowing up 
each other. Take, for example, the case of our 
own dear old brewery. What has become of all 
the men we used to employ there ? Some three 
or four of the best came with us, or else followed 
us later on, but the others have all scattered, and 
I could not put my hand at the moment on one 
of them. Service was inheritance in the old days ; 
fathers brought on their sons in the cooperage ; 
the cooper had his own son to be apprenticed to 
him ; the maltsters who came year by year were 
succeeded by their sons ; the carters the same. 
I knew them all, had personal touch with them 
all; now I can pass our waggons in the street; 
the men do not know me by sight; there is no 
kindly interchange of word; we are strangers to 
each other, and must always remain so. There 
never was a truer curse than the one called down 
on those who add " house to house and field to 
field," and with its usual far-sighted common 
sense the Bible can account for the present state 
of things. A small business can be looked after 
from A to Z by the master ; a large one means a 
certain number of understudies, who are not the 
masters ; but who are one and all bent on doing 
the utmost for themselves, doing the least amount 
338 



ALARUMS AND EXCURSIONS 

of work, and getting away to play the moment 
they decently can. Have we not too permanently 
lost enormously : I do not mean financially only, 
but sentimentally: over this amalgamation? 
In the old days we had to get ready for the 
maltsters, who slept in the malt-house by the fire, 
and whose blankets had to be stored indoors, 
washed, aired, and changed by us. If a woman 
became a mother we had the " maternity bag " 
ready for her ; we gave her a well-cooked meal 
for a fortnight, and saw she did not hurry up 
unduly, and that she in due time had her infant 
christened and fed it in a proper way ; we got 
the girls places, and the boys put out in the 
world ; and I even began to hope that the terrible 
reply "We give 'em what we has ourselves" to 
my question as to how the babies were fed was 
extinct ; when the change came and we had to 
leave a place that I had hated for years and had 
at last learned to love as I shall love no other 
place again: of that I am very sure. 

But the last three years of our lives there 
were simply awful ; we never knew what might 
happen, who might turn against us ; what actions 
might be brought against us, and by whom. On 
one side was a great deal of money and vast 
accumulations of hatred ; on ours was passive re- 
sistance ; but the strain of it all was unendurable, 
and I do not know to this day how I lived through 
those troublous times. I must honestly confess 
that I envy any one who, like Becky Sharp's 

339 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

ideal, is honest on a certain sure income; and I 
can feel for the hungry Socialist who sees apparent 
wealth roll by him in her carriage ; all the same 
I know we have had more chances than most, 
and if we are not in smoother waters in our old 
age it is simply because we are fools and because 
we none of us have the smallest idea how to save. 
I shall always regret the family brewery, but 
the worst years of all, I think, were the four when 
we were waiting for our money, and nothing at 
all was coming in. All the same it is astonishing 
to recollect, not only what good times we had, 
but what sterling friends turned up ; and I only 
regret I did not see my way then to live in a 
small and quiet way, send the children to Board 
schools, and so gradually live without any 
ambitions or any dread for the future. 

Yet do I regret it ? We did have the most 
glorious times ; the boys have been to Harrow and 
one to Cambridge, and no one can take that away 
from them ; while the girls can and do earn their 
living, and I would much rather they did that 
than married and continued the family, which 
on both sides has qualities which are best forgotten 
and not perpetuated any more. If we had only 
had the sense to stick to the brewery we should 
have been there now, and for the life of me I 
cannot now understand why we did not. There 
was a belief that the town was gone down hope- 
lessly, but we had never depended on the town. 
The neighbourhood was growing, is growing by 
340 



ALARUMS AND EXCURSIONS 

leaps and bounds, and, moreover, the vast amount 
of capital that was sunk in " old beer " in the 
enormous oaken tuns would not now have been 
required. The old strong beer is never sold now, 
as it used to be ; very light stuff is made and 
drunk ; and : pace a female novelist, who writes as 
if every brewer went round his houses and mash- 
tuns at night, draped in a cloak, and masked ; to 
pour arsenic and other poisons into his beer: 
I question whether a cleaner, better, or safer 
drink can be found in the world. 

But our " alarums and excursions " ended in 
our exit from the scene, so impatient was our 
supplanter to take the reins. I think she held 
them for about eight or nine years ; then clouds 
rolled up, retribution seized her and hers, and 
she vanished from the old place, where the name 
is now painted out over all the houses and is 
forgotten as if it had never been. I am not in 
the least ashamed of being connected with " The 
Trade," and I only most devoutly wish I could 
still personally mother our men's wives and see 
to them all, all round ; but it is impossible to 
have any share in what I may call the domestic 
side of a " company." The men are too numerous, 
the houses too scattered, and the business is 
nothing but a name: and a nuisance. I am 
certain, too, that a company is like a Board, a 
soulless thing without a body to be kicked or a 
soul to be saved, and I should gladly go back 
even to the smallest brewery of the lot, if I could, 

341 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURE S 

where one knew everything that went on, and 
knew all the men, women, and children by name 
quite well. We always used to have them all 
to tea twice a year ; and when the men came too, 
to supper as well ; and on one of these occasions we 
were visited by the real old Christmas mummers, 
who still, I believe, make a round in that par- 
ticular neighbourhood. They honestly terrified 
me, for the leader, who acted as did the Greek 
chorus and growled out an explanation of what 
was going on, wore a horrid sheepskin over his 
face, and crept round the circle of onlookers in a 
blood-curdling manner. As was natural in those 
parts, Napoleon entered a good deal into the 
drama the lads enacted, but as St. George, the 
little doctor, and the Knight of Morocco, with his 
face blacked, also had a share, it was difficult indeed 
to discover what was intended to be played. The 
lads all wore smocks embellished with yards 
upon yards of coloured paper strips ; these fell 
over their faces also, and formed a species of mask. 
The fights were most resolute also; and as the 
dreadful man in the sheepskin crept about the 
combatants and encouraged them to slay each 
other, I was truly glad when the play was over, 
the mummers paid and refreshed, and they had 
gone on elsewhere to enact the play all over again. 

We had one more adventure before we left 
the place that may be worth recording. We had 
produced with infinite trouble and care a par- 
ticular kind of light beer that I always shall 
34a 



ALARUMS AND EXCURSIONS 

think ought to have been an enormous success. 
Truth was then clamouring for Hghter beer ; a 
cask was sent up to the office, with the result of 
a splendid " notice," which brought such hundreds 
of orders that the beer could not be supphed in 
time. It gave me at any rate an insight into 
business matters that I have never forgotten. 
In the first place, one should never speak of an 
article until one is more than ready to supply it ; 
and, in the second, it is always easy to sell a thing 
that really does fit a demand. Out of that 
advertisement, or rather notice, a certain Captain 
N. wrote to the brewery and volunteered a visit. 
His name and rank were as stated in the Army 
List, and he came down, and great were the things 
he was prepared to do. He had the ear of all the 
Mess Presidents in the United Kingdom; all he 
required was a sample of the beer and a small 
sum of money for initial expenses. We were 
fools enough to give him both, albeit in justice 
to myself let me say I could not bear the man, 
and he returned to Aldershot to make all arrange- 
ments. From that day to this we never heard 
any more from Captain N. ; he disappeared into 
thin air ; and though letters written to him neither 
returned nor brought replies, we were not sharp 
enough to write to his colonel. Is it not curious 
that for about thirty pounds and a cask of beer 
an " officer and a gentleman " could have 
condescended to play a " tradesman " such an 
unspeakably dishonest trick ? 

343 



CHAPTER XIV 

UPROOTING 

When we first moved away from the old home 
I really did think I should have broken my heart, 
and I yet recollect with anguish how I used to 
sit out in our suburban garden and yearn for 
the view of the beautiful hills, for which, indeed, 
I yet long whenever I have any time to rest and 
dream. I did not live there more than thirteen 
years : indeed, it was just thirteen years almost 
to the day when we left: but I suppose I had 
assimilated the home atmosphere into which I 
had married, and the hundred and fifty years 
that had held my husband's family had twined 
round me, and I can honestly say that from that 
day to this we have never really taken root again 
in any other soil. We went for a few months 
to Bournemouth, which I loved, and which was 
then very different from the place it is now ; the 
pines had not been cut down, and there were 
no trams to desecrate the place. How well I 
recollect it when there was no arcade, only a stile 
and a sweet little brook ; when there was a 
344 



UPROOTING 

thatched pubHc-house called the " Tregonwell 
Arms " opposite where the public gardens are 
now; when there were no houses on the Poole 
road, and when there was no railway beyond 
Christchurch ! Then Boscombe merely consisted 
of Sir H. Drummond Wolfe's and the Shelleys' 
houses, and there were no yards upon yards of 
small villas leading straight away from Bourne- 
mouth into Christchurch itself. While wide and 
exquisite heath-land stretched where houses are 
now crowded on the West and Canford Cliffs, and 
where there was only a ride, "the old ride," 
through the Branksome Woods, and not one 
single house was there to spoil the lovely place. 
I have ridden there on my pony through 
groves of rhododendrons and pine-trees and not 
met a soul, and though I have no doubt the 
alteration is " good for trade " it most certainly 
has spoiled the place in a very depressing manner. 
I recollect, too, when the ponds were used for 
skating on in winter, and when Harry Taylor, 
Sir Henry Taylor's son, made a gallant attempt 
to rescue a lad there by diving under the ice, 
and bringing him out, but unfortunately too late : 
the boy was already dead. And above all do I 
remember the visits we used to pay to Sir Percy 
and Lady Shelley at Boscombe, where there was 
a room set apart for the poet's relics, where we 
gazed at the book he held in his hand when he 
was drowned, and which still showed the impress 
of his thumb. Moreover, under a glass shade lay 

345 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

the last sheet of paper on which he wrote, the pen 
thrown down just as he left it when he went out 
for the last time, a blot of ink denoting where 
the pen had been cast as he carelessly put aside 
his work and went out to his death ; and there 
were locks of Shelley's and Byron's hair, and 
other personal belongings which I used to look at 
with the greatest awe and wonder. At the end 
of the room was a copy of the exquisite memorial 
to Shelley that stands in Christchurch Cathedral, 
and, indeed, the whole room resembled nothing 
so much as a mortuary chamber. 

Sir Percy and Lady Shelley were most hospit- 
able, and were likewise very much addicted to 
private theatricals. Anything less like a poet to 
look at than Sir Percy I have never seen ; he was 
far more like what John Leech would have called 
a "horsey gent"; but he was extremely clever, 
and not only painted the scenery, but composed 
the music and wrote the plays in which he and 
his house party used to appear. Personally, I 
only saw Caste at the Shelley theatre, in which 
one of my sisters was Esther and my daughter's 
great doll, " Regina," was requisitioned for the 
part of " Master D'Alroy," much to her rage 
and despair ; but I thought the play excellent, 
albeit my joy was somewhat chastened by the 
remarks of the people beside me, who asked me 
to point out the celebrities. I did so as far 
as I could, when one of them exclaimed, " Oh ! 
I knew that man must be artistic: he is so 
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UPROOTING 

infamously filthy," which was a pleasant remark 
to make to one who was herself the daughter of 
an artist and egregiously proud of this fact. 
Amongst the audience was George Macdonald, 
and I looked at him with great interest. He 
and his were certainly rather " artistic " to look 
at, but I should think a better, kinder, or more 
unworldly man never existed on this earth. He 
had not the least idea of money or money's worth, 
lived on a pittance, and shared his crust with 
any one who could be thought to require a 
portion of it at all. I think most of his large 
family died before he did, but he was an excellent 
father and a good man ; he worked from morning 
to night, and I should say few men did more real 
good or left a more fragrant memory behind them. 
All the same the family was queer to look at, 
and I have a confused recollection of Liberty 
stuffs, low, collarless gowns, and beads as regards 
the women, and long hair and wild ties as regards 
the men, that produced an effect that was some- 
what startling among an evening-gowned, white- 
tied audience of the most orthodox sort. Lady 
Shelley herself was an enthusiastic believer in 
ghosts, and used to declare she had seen innumer- 
able ones and that she held constant communica- 
tion with the poet himself. I recollect that at 
one time she was supposed to keep the poet's 
heart in a silver casket in the Shelley room, but 
this she emphatically denied ; all the same I do 
not see why she should not have done so had 

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FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

she chosen; the Shelley room was a shrine, and 
was treated as such by all who had the privilege 
of entering it. I wonder if it is still kept up. It 
was rather a gruesome place, and had I the house 
I should be tempted to clear it out and hand the 
contents thereof over to some museum. 

For some years before her death Lady Shelley 
was a great invalid and could not walk, and I 
recollect one day she was placed out on her couch 
in the garden as usual and left there while the 
establishment was at dinner. A tremendous 
storm came on ; no one thought about her ; at 
last by some terrific effort of will she rose from 
the sofa and walked indoors. It is a pity a 
Christian Scientist was not about to claim her 
as a cure. All the same the cure did not last, 
and I think after that she very soon died. I knew 
another woman who acted in a similar manner 
during a fire ; she walked out of the house, 
walked about for three or four months, and then 
as suddenly as she had recovered her powers of 
locomotion she died, and so proved without 
doubt that she had had a mortal disease on her 
all the time. 

While we were at Bournemouth I went over to 
see Barnes, the Dorset poet, more than once, and 
he gave me a book of his verses with his autograph 
in it, which I possessed until the other day, when 
I gave it to a most ungrateful and detestable 
relation of mine, and now I devoutly wish I had 
done nothing of the sort. Barnes then lived at 
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the dearest little country vicarage, called Winter- 
borne Came, within about a mile of Dorchester, 
and he was certainly a most interesting per- 
sonality, and I could never understand how it 
took the years it did for his verses to become 
well known. I think they were published in the 
"Poet's Corner" of the county newspaper; and 
I furthermore believe that my friend Kegan Paul 
was the first person to introduce them into a 
wider atmosphere, but of that I am not sure. 
When I saw him first he was sufficiently well 
known for Edmund Yates to ask me to write a 
sketch of him for his " Celebrity of the Week " 
column in the World, and I believe he afterwards 
was extremely cross because his house and person 
were described and because I printed exactly 
what he told me about himself. He never said 
so to me : I was always very friendly with him, 
and with one of his daughters, and as he knew 
what I was going to do, and knew just how those 
columns were done, he need not have resented 
what he most certainly allowed. Moreover, as 
usual in those days, a proof of the " interview " 
was submitted to him, and as he returned it 
unaltered to the office one could only suppose 
that he was satisfied with what had been said. 
Personally I found him very difficult to under- 
stand ; he had lost his teeth and had not replaced 
them ; he spoke with a strong Dorset accent, 
and though he assured me that Dorset was the 
only relic of the Saxon speech left in England 

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FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

and I was duly impressed, that statement did not 
help me to comprehend it. He was a very 
picturesque jfigure, with his leonine head and 
white beard, his knee-breeches and buckled shoes, 
and some of his verses are unsurpassed. It is a 
pity he was not better known in his lifetime ; he 
would have immensely appreciated fame, and 
that never came to the thatched rectory in which 
he ended his days. He began life as a school- 
master, and I think among his pupils he numbered 
the present Sir Frederick Treves, who was born 
in Dorchester in a house in the High Street, where, 
when last I saw it, the paternal name was yet 
above the door. 

While we were at Bournemouth I well recollect 
the Sunday on which we heard of the appalling 
murder of Mr. Burke and Lord Frederick 
Cavendish, and I can see " Idstone " coming up 
to our door from the club on the sands and telling 
me the hideous news. And about that time, too, 
we had the most tremendous gale I ever recollect. 
I fancy it was the Saturday after the murder. 
We tried to walk down to the town, but had to 
cling to every lamp-post as we went to gasp for 
breath. The wall of the garden blew down just 
as a child blows down a wall of toy bricks ; 
hedges were stripped, or else the young foliage 
looked as if a fire had passed over it; and 
when on the next day we attempted to go out 
for a drive, we tried five separate roads ; but great 
trees were down all over the place, and we had 
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to turn back and give up the idea of a drive 
for some few days at least. This was in April 
1882, and from then until August we were trying 
to make up our minds what to do and where to 
live. Common sense, represented by my voice, 
suggested that we should remain where we were 
until our breweries were paid for ; other people 
suggested that we should go as near London as 
we could, London being a good place to be close 
to, and where work could be found; and finally 
we set out on our first house-hunting expedition, 
and from that day to this it seems to me that 
we have done nothing else. We wished to be near 
some friends, and so pitched on the neighbour- 
hood of the Crystal Palace ; and were it possible 
I could write pages about the awful houses we 
were sent to see. Great houses in tiny gardens ; 
the railway having swallowed up the gardens or 
small parks that were once attached to them, the 
poor mansions were left deserted and to be had 
for almost nothing ; but were so large, so cracked, 
so out of repair that they are by now no doubt 
long since fallen in the dust themselves. Then 
we saw terrace-houses, each one more horrible 
than the other ; houses hanging on the side of 
hills, and houses looking into the eyes of opposite 
houses in the most nerve-shattering way ; until 
finally we found the delightful suburb of Short- 
lands, and an equally delightful house and land- 
lord, and there, despite hard times and hard 
work, I at any rate passed four of the happiest 

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FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

years of my busy life. Shortlands is no more 
the dear friendly place it used to be, where we 
could go out to dinner walking, with shawls over 
our shoulders and snow-boots against the mud 
over our evening shoes ; where we could " run 
in and out" to beloved neighbours; and where, 
if Mrs. Craik ruled us all somewhat with a rod 
of iron, we all bowed beneath her sceptre and 
much enjoyed the evenings we spent and the 
people we met at her lovely home, the " Corner 
House." I quite well recollect meeting Mr. Lowell, 
the American Minister, there, and being much 
struck by him and his courtly and charming 
manners. Mary Anderson, now Madame de 
Navarro, was a constant visitor, and, being as 
beautiful off the stage as she was on, did not 
disappoint me, as actresses all too often do if 
one sees them without the glamour of the foot- 
lights. At one time Wilson Barrett, the actor, 
was constantly at the Corner House, and there 
was some idea of his producing one of Mrs. Craik' s 
novels as a play, but he never did somehow ; and 
I do not myself recollect one that is of sufficient 
dramatic power to turn into a play. Her forte 
was the peaceful domestic story, and she could 
never have been dramatic, try as hard as she 
would. I wish we had liked each other better 
than we did, for I know she would have done 
me a great deal of good, but her autocratic ways 
tried me too much then for me to tolerate what 
now I should receive with gratitude. But she 
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UPROOTING 

had a way of pressing her proteges on me that was 
trying ; and, moreover, when she had a wedding at 
her house, she appropriated our carriage and gave 
written orders to my coachman in a manner that 
caused " ructions," and after that we really never 
saw much of her again. She died shortly after 
we left Shortlands, quite suddenly, and I hope 
painlessly, though she did suffer pain at times, 
which she declared was indigestion. I told her 
it was heart, and gave her sundry remedies I 
always kept by me ; she used them now and 
then, under her doctor's supervision of course, 
but I always think if she had spared her strength, 
and, moreover, had taken brandy when she was 
at the last gasp almost, she would have lived 
much longer. Herkomer painted an excellent 
likeness of her, and I hope whoever possesses it 
now, will leave it some day to the National Portrait 
Gallery. Mrs. Craik was not a George Eliot ; all 
the same she is entitled to a niche in the Temple 
of Fame, and her portrait is a good picture, and 
that is more than can be said for many of the 
portraits that are now in the nation's possession 
as representative of the greatest " men and 
women of the time." 

Among the people who used to come to us at 
Shortlands was Mr. Anstey- Guthrie, but as he is 
happily still alive one can say but very little about 
him. He burst into fame quite suddenly in 1882 by 
the publication of " Vice- Versa," and I have often 
laughed to myself over the fact that I bought a 
z 353 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

copy of that delightful book because he was a 
friend of one of my brothers, and so I hoped to 
encourage the sale. The first appearance of " Vice- 
Versa " was in a paper called the Cambridge Taller, 
edited by my brother, but as he made innocent fun 
of the dons of, I think, Jesus, he was " sent down " 
and the Taller came to an unhappy end. My 
brother was forgiven for what after all was an 
absurd and boyish trick ; and the dons were made 
ridiculous in their turn in the World by Edmund 
Yates. But the Taller being dead, " Vice- Versa " 
retired into private life or at least only issued 
therefrom to make journeys to imbecile pubHshers, 
who one and all declined a book, that must have 
made a fortune more than once. The day after 
it was brought out, one of the newspapers had 
a leading article upon it, and its author woke 
to find himself famous in a manner that very few 
people have ever been fortunate enough to do ! 
I was lucky enough once to have a good idea for a 
story ; but I did not feel I could deal with it as 
it ought to be dealt with, so I presented the idea 
to Mr. Guthrie ; the result as far as the public 
is concerned was " The Fallen Idol," as far as I 
am concerned was the sketch by Du Maurier, 
reproduced here, which illustrates a scene out of 
the book. Personally I do not admire the dog; 
it is too much like the Idol itself to suit me, dog- 
lover that I am; but the sketch is a delightful 
link between me and the book, and therefore will 
always be valuable. 
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UPROOTING 

Other people we saw a good deal of were the 
Scott-Gattys, a charming couple, she lovely to 
look at, and with a voice, a singing voice, that 
I cannot forget, it was so good. Neither shall I 
forget the household, which was so charming 
and clever ; including as it did sometimes Mrs. 
Ewing, a sad invalid almost chained to her sofa, 
where she wrote her sweet and delightful books ; 
and her sister, who was devoted to microscopic 
work and to Aunt Judy^s Magazine ; where I used 
to write a great deal until it died, and I do not 
think has ever been replaced. From Shortlands, 
too, I visited Jean Ingelow, a little shrinking 
woman, to whom strangers were a distress ; and, 
moreover, I more than once went to Mrs. Peter 
Taylor's at homes, where the suffrage for women 
was demanded by sundry so-called " shrieking 
sisters." I wonder what Mrs. Peter Taylor would 
say if she could arise and hear the suffragettes ! 
They were very mild indeed in her day, but even 
then were a good deal more than I personally 
could stand ; more especially as Mr. Peter Taylor 
and I almost came to blows on the subject both 
of flogging garrotters and other malefactors and 
on the matter of vaccination. I quite well 
recollected the dread we had of garrotters as 
children in 1862-3, and I equally well remembered 
how efficiently they were put a stop to by being 
flogged ; and no statistics any one can produce 
now will ever convince me to the contrary. 
While I knew an old gentleman who told me 

355 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

when he was a lad, he recollected that it was the 
commonest thing in the world to see women 
spoiled for life by smallpox ; but that since vacci- 
nation came in, one hardly met any one who 
showed any mark of the fell disease. 

Our proximity to London and the cheap return 
fare made the Shortlands years delightful to me, 
and if we could have been settled there I should 
have never wanted to move again. The house 
was such a nice one, and we made the garden 
out of a field ; and if the flowers did not flourish 
as they did in our first home, they were very 
delightful ; though our pleasure was often marred 
by the hordes of " beanf casters " who passed by 
and broke off great branches of any flowering 
shrubs they could. Bicycles were becoming 
ubiquitous, and I should not have been sorry if 
Shortlands had been somewhere farther out of the 
riders' reach ; but we could not get our money, and 
all we could do was to wait near London until such 
time as it could be had, and another brewery 
bought. My husband gallantly went to school 
once more to the London University Chemical 
Laboratory, and I turned to journalistic work 
and wrote from early morn until dewy eve. 

I had then, beside Sir John Robinson, two 
very good, kind, and firm friends in the late Mr. 
John Latey and Mr. Alfred Gibbons of the Lady's 
Pictorial, and to the latter especially do I owe 
a measure of gratitude I shall never forget. One 
day he sent for me to the office and asked me 
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UPROOTING 

if I thought I could undertake the editorship, 
under his guidance, of the paper; but I imme- 
diately said I could, I was sure, do nothing of the 
kind. I had not an atom of faith in my critical 
powers. I knew what I liked, but I could not 
answer for any one else. I would do any work 
he gave me, and thankfully; but take the helm 
of any ship, no matter how small, I for one never 
could. " Well," he said, " have you any ideas that 
are new ? " I had suffered a good deal when living 
in the country from not being able to get what I 
wanted from the London shops ; I had, moreover, 
a very quick eye ; and above all I had just been 
helping a dear young couple to furnish their first 
house on a sum of money so small that it would 
not be believed in in these days ; so I replied, 
" Yes, I think I have " ; and I explained that 
I thought a series of articles on the furnishing 
and managing of a house would take on ; as most 
certainly the idea had never been used before by 
any lady's paper. This was some time early in 
1883, and the ladies' papers of that day were 
very, very different from what they are now. 
I think the Lady's Pictorial had just become 
sixpence from a threepenny venture, but it was 
a thin and elegant production, with but few 
illustrated advertisements. The venerable and 
respectable and respected Queen was also very 
different from what it is at the present day, 
and I think there were no other papers for 
women specially of any account, though there 

357 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

were, of course, fashion journals pur et simple, 
made up of coloured prints from Paris, and 
cut paper patterns ; from which the home dress- 
maker might evolve her own garments of a sort ; 
but neither furniture, decorations, nor home 
management appeared in any of them. Mr. 
Gibbons jumped at the idea. " Go home and 
write a specimen article," he said, " and if it 
goes we'll have some questions and answers ; and 
you'll see that will be a good thing both for you 
and the paper. By the way, send about half a 
dozen ' replies ' with your first article." " In- 
deed I won't," I repHed. " Just see how fooUsh 
we should look, even if I would do such a thing ! 
How could people ask questions about things 
mentioned in an article that they had never 
seen ? " Mr. Gibbons roared with laughter. 
" Oh, write the article ; I'll see to the rephes " ; 
and I went home, bursting with ideas and im- 
portance, and wrote the article, which formed 
the first chapter of " From Kitchen to Garret," 
which went into eleven editions ; and though 
obsolete nowadays is still a classic on the shelves 
of some of my old correspondents, who married, 
brought up families, and set them up too in 
their married lives out of that excellent work ! 
Mr. Gibbons was always a good and firm friend 
to me, and we very soon laughed together over 
the proposed " dozen replies." I often had a 
hundred letters in the week from all parts of the 
globe ; and the easy-going journalists of the dav 
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UPROOTING 

would never credit how I sought high and low 
for the cheapest and best things to advise people 
to buy; while in my earliest days I even bought 
my own patterns, so that I could always have 
them by me for reference. My idea was soon 
copied, and my very words stolen ; but I survived 
it all, and went on my way rejoicing, until I did 
too much work, and my health came almost 
utterly to grief. All the same I loved the work ; 
the letters were so entertaining ; I had such 
delightful presents sent me, and I made such 
charming friends. In connection with my column 
we started a place where poor ladies could sell 
their work, but I must confess that these same 
poor ladies nearly were my last straw. A rich 
and kindly- hearted lady took rooms and put one 
of her protegees in charge, and she and I visited 
the rooms on alternate days. I recollect three 
old sisters coming to us for work. They lived 
in one room somewhere in Islington, and they 
were, so they said, starving. I think they were ; 
anyhow we had an " order " on hand for some 
homely night-shirts, and we gave the calico to the 
sisters. I could see the parcel rather alarmed 
them, so we made it up into three separate ones, 
and they went off ; they could have earned ten 
shillings, and machine work was allowed. Will 
it be believed they sent back the stuff by carrier 
— unpaid — and asked for something lighter ? 
Being ladies, they really could not undertake such 
heavy work. Another girl could embroider most 

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FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

beautifully ; to her we handed a quilt, wanted 
by a certain time for a wedding present ; that 
met' with no better fate than the night-shirts. 
She kept it a month past the wedding-day, and 
brought it back so filthy that it was absolutely 
useless. She actually excused herself by saying 
she had been paying a round of visits, and now 
might she have the money, for she was up to her 
neck in debt ? She remained there as far as we 
were concerned ; she had ruined our silks and 
our beautiful material, and notwithstanding that, 
she expected to receive payment for what had 
cost us pounds, and lost us a most excellent 
customer. No poor ladies for me ! No doubt 
they are much improved since 1885 onwards, 
but those experiences really sickened me, espe- 
cially when we discovered the trusted manageress 
was not above snipping bits off costly brocades, 
and appropriating all sorts of trifles that dis- 
appeared in a most singular manner. 

I had quite an awful adventure one afternoon 
after leaving the depot, for I had bought a 
villainous woollen doll that the manageress had 
a stock of, made, as she said, by an old widow 
who depended on the sale for her daily bread. 
Her bread must have been very scanty if she did, 
but I bought the awful thing, refused a paper cover, 
and went on my way down the Euston Road. In 
that abominable thoroughfare I met a very dirty 
woman, with a much dirtier child, who looked at 
the doll with the most unspeakable longing in 
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UPROOTING 

her eyes. "Some one," I thought, "always 
appreciates something, no matter how hideous it 
is, and that child shall have the nightmare I am 
carrying " ; and stooping down I said, " Would 
you like the doll ? " The child's face was trans- 
figured ; she held out her grimy little shaking 
hands, and, putting the doll into them, I was 
going on my way rejoicing, when the mother said, 
" Oh, kiss the lady, darhng ! " The lady was 
kissed, but I wondered for at least a week what 
disease I had caught, and was much relieved to 
find I had passed scatheless through the ordeal. 

As long as I was on the Lady's Pictorial I 
could sell through it anything I liked ; and I most 
emphatically state I never recommended any- 
thing I did not like ; and many poor ladies and 
others must have benefited by that excellent 
paper. At last the " rooms " became too much for 
me, and we persuaded my sisters to take on the 
work. My father could or would no longer 
maintain them, and from that small beginning 
to the present time they have made their own 
way in the world, and, as far as I know, have done 
very fairly well. 

The most amusing and lucrative branch of 
my work was that which took me about to other 
people's houses, where I looked at their belongings 
and advised them what to do with them in the 
way of repairs or redecoration ; and if I were 
often tempted to say, " Burn the lot and begin 
all over again," I always met nice people, and 

361 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

made some most delightful friends and acquaint- 
ances from these erstwhile strangers. It always 
amused me more than I can say to see how they 
hated having to hand me my fee ; but at last 
I always used to tell them I had not the least 
delicacy about taking money I had earned ; and 
I soon took it openly and without the covering 
paper that more than once served as a shield to 
show the absence of the shillings from the guineas. 
But I always opened the envelope boldly and 
asked for the shillings, and we were none the 
worse friends for " thinking " a mistake had 
been made. 

I had one or two rather appalling adventures, 
and, if I had been younger, I might perhaps 
have found myself in an awkward situation, but 
somehow or other I never did. I have to this 
day, or rather should have if I had not spent it 
twenty years ago, the sum of £20 that has never 
been earned, nor accounted for, and I cannot 
now think why it was sent. Presumably I was 
to go to the Isle of Wight, inspect a house, and 
draw up a scheme for furniture and decoration ; 
before I could go I got a wire from the sender : 
" Wait further instructions." I waited, and 
then wrote and wrote. No instructions came; 
only a post-card : " Keep the money and await 
instructions." It is, by the way, twenty-five 
years ago, and from that day to this I have never 
had a solution of the mystery. The Statute of 
Limitations protects me, and nothing after all 
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UPROOTING 

these years would induce me to give up the money, 
even if I could recollect the name of the person 
who sent it ! 

I very often wished in those days that I was 
an unmarried woman, and could avail myself of 
the many delightful opportunities that were 
offered me of seeing the world. I was asked to 
go to India to help a Maharajah decorate his 
palace to receive the late Duke of Clarence ; to 
go to Chicago to decorate a pavilion for the 
exhibition, and to Australia for a similar object. 
In regard to this I may mention that, as I could 
not go, I sent out a " scheme." This was used 
with such excellent effect that the fair " origi- 
nator " was awarded a prize, of which I heard 
quite by accident, and in which, of course, I never 
for one instant shared. 

The most curious adventure was in regard to 
a house in St. John's Wood, and if I had not 
been far more innocent than my years should 
have allowed me to be, I should have at once 
understood the class of house it most undoubtedly 
was, for I have never been in a more utterly 
filthy and degraded-looking abode. I was to 
look over the furniture and see what could be 
used for a house in a country town where the 
husband of my correspondent was about to live, 
as he had " taken over the hounds." I had 
found out, as I always did, all about the people. 
I had seen the house in the country town, and 
the hounds were to be taken over, and I had my 

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FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

fees all right enough. But the house in London 
was unspeakable ; stains of wine were on every- 
thing ; nothing could be used as it was ; and I 
was given carte blanche to engage a tradesman 
to cart away the stuff and clear out the house. 
This he did, sent his estimate, which was accepted, 
and the work went on, until one day he received 
a wire to stop work both on the furniture and 
the house. He was paid in full, and from that 
day to this I never knew, though I could make a 
shrewd guess of what happened. More especially 
as I saw a divorce case which was a novel in 
itself — a youth bamboozled by a clever woman 
posing as an heiress of untold gold ; an irate 
and astute father who discovered the truth ; an 
old lover or two ; an easy divorce, and a respect- 
able family eased from a member who should 
never have belonged to it for an instant ! 

Unfortunately the profession I had started 
was taken up by people utterly unfit for the 
work, and, moreover, entirely in the power of 
their newspapers and the " advertisers " on whom, 
of course, all papers depend more or less ; and 
at last no one could be found to believe that 
" advice " was disinterested. I am glad to say 
that before this happened I had had to give the 
work up. I was very sorry to do so ; my news- 
papers had always been patience and goodness 
themselves to me, and I cannot speak too highly 
of first the dear old Lady^s Pictorial and then of 
the Gentlewoman. But I had worked a great deal 
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UPROOTING 

too hard ; my health broke up in the most trying 
manner, and I gave up journalism with many 
a pang ; and for some years did nothing very 
much to speak of, except change my house in a 
vain attempt to find a place that suited me. I 
really think, though, that when we moved to 
Watford, in Hertfordshire, that move, and not my 
work, was at the bottom of my first breakdown. 
Foolishly, and against my better judgment, I 
took a house between the London and North- 
western Railway and a Board school. " You 
won't notice either when you have been there a 
week," said my friends. Not notice either ! 
I used to wait for the sounds, one after the other. 
I knew just when the Scotch express would go 
through, when the signals would fall, and the goods 
trains shunt ; moreover, I had to look forward 
to the children coming out to play in the middle 
of the lessons. And when they left school pande- 
monium was let loose, and I could, and very 
often did, weep aloud over the hideous noise 
they made. I was superlatively miserable and 
wretched in Watford, and I do not think I have 
one pleasant memory connected with the place. 



365 



CHAPTER XV 
GREEN PASTURES 

If I had to say which part of my life had been 
the happiest, I think I should most unhesitatingly 
reply, that which I had spent out of the stream of 
life and among green pastures. I consider myself 
entitled to speak on the subject too, for I have 
tried all sorts and conditions of existence. London 
life at its fullest and best ; country town life at 
its worst and dullest, and at its very inferior best 
too ; suburban life, and life in what one may term 
a suburban town, namely, Watford ; which, from 
a real country town with beautiful old red-brick 
houses in its streets and delightful gardens, has 
become a workman's dwelling-place, crowded 
with factories and small houses where once were 
quite other abodes. Indeed, I do not know 
anything more melancholy than to drive from 
London to Watford by road, and nothing gives 
one a clearer idea of what the suburbs once were 
than to do so. I recollect the time when we 
passed fine old houses in walled gardens ; a 
magnificent park with a great house with lodges, 
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GREEN PASTURES 

about which scandalous stories were told with 
gusto by the " oldest inhabitant " ; when the 
long steep street of Edgware was beautiful to 
behold, and one emerged on the top to find 
Stanmore Common, a paradise indeed for all 
alike. Then came the village of Bushey, which, 
alas ! soon became spoiled. Here blossomed out 
a row of hideous tin studios, there the tremendous 
residence of the archpriest of art himself ; and 
bit by bit field and hedgerow, tree and garden, 
were consumed, until the erstwhile pleasant place 
has become a suburb of the most blatant style. 
It is extraordinary how, in a spot supposed to 
be consecrated to art, nature has been killed, 
and art has expressed herself in iron shanties and 
little villas, while the only thing that remains to 
remind one of the lovely old street is the church ; 
but even close to that the trees have gone, and 
more villas are every day springing into life. 
I think there is nothing more dreadful to one 
who loves the country, than to see the manner 
in which London stretches out her arms and bit 
by bit draws all the open spaces to herself ; 
stretching out her hmbs octopus-like, and with 
much the same effect as an octopus has on its 
victims. Within the last twenty years fine old 
estates within a ten-mile radius of town have 
been " cut up for building," the big houses pulled 
down after sometimes making a struggle for 
existence as a hotel or a boarding-house, while 
the exquisite old gardens are cut up and destroyed. 

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FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

Nothing can ever replace these gardens ; they were, 
as are the Oxford lawns, the product of centuries ; 
and I cannot help thinking that more sense of the 
fitness of things would have been shown had the 
speculative builder saved the gardens ; even if the 
estates had to go ; and had replaced the enormous 
houses by smaller and more liveable-in abodes. 

I shall never forget the anguish I suffered at 
seeing a wood I particularly loved near Short- 
lands given over to the all- destructive builder, 
and I wish there could be some society formed 
for the preservation of similar places. The last 
owner of the estate died, and the place had to 
be sold : there was no help for it. I went up 
the day before the sale and looked once more at 
the familiar place. There were tokens of the 
destroyer's hand on all sides. Even the doors 
were marked Lot 21 or Lot 32, as the case might 
be ; the carvings in the rooms were " lots " also ; 
while the beautiful old lawn was trampled to 
pieces by the men already at work on the necessary 
destruction. Trees were cut down, and where 
I knew bluebells and snowdrops had come up 
year after year, as they only come up and flourish 
when they are undisturbed, vast holes were 
already sunk for scaffold-poles; and now a red- 
brick house, grown to the respectable age of 
twenty-five, stands where my well-loved flowers 
never failed me once it was spring. I came across 
the quaint old arbour, with its hard, uncomfortable 
stone seats, where lovers no doubt had sat for 
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GREEN PASTURES 

years and years ; but the saddest corner of all 
was that which held the children's gardens. 
These had been kept up by the old head gardener 
from season to season, though the children had 
long since grown up, scattered and gone away, 
and all, to the very last of them, had died. That 
old man had once been the garden-boy, teased 
and ordered about and tyrannised over by the 
lads and lassies ; he had outlived them all, and 
I was looking for the last time at the gardens 
which he and I were never to see from that day 
on for evermore. 

Poor ghosts of the late owners ! I trust they 
were too far away to see what was happening. 
We can bear life pretty well ; we can see our 
dreams wither and our places filled; but we 
cannot bear the destruction of the world we once 
knew, and it would be awful to have to return 
and wander about on an earth which has become 
as nothing we can recollect ! I have not forgotten 
in the least what it was to be young ; I have not 
forgotten that I once wanted to reform everything 
and make everything better around me ; all the 
same I never, never wanted to change the face of 
the old familiar streets and lanes I loved. Even 
in my strenuous youth I abominated the changes 
in Westbourne Grove ; I liked the little houses 
and gardens better than the big shops ; and I 
had the greatest horror of change of any sort 
or kind. I recollect Papa prophesying that 
shops would creep up to our doors some time, 
2A 369 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

and our rage at the very idea. Well, the shops 
are there, and as we do not live there it does not 
much matter ; but I do deprecate change, and 
wish all might be as it used to be when we were 
young and thought that place of abode little 
short of Paradise. 

If that were Paradise, I have twice had other 
places that were very like what I can imagine 
Paradise might be, and the last one was the best 
of all these. It would not, perhaps, have struck 
any one else in that light ; we were four miles 
from a tiny station, eight from a town ; the 
house was a nutshell, the water-supply e ^early 
torment and problem. We had not a neij^ixbour 
for miles, and I have often gone a week without 
speaking to a soul outside the household, a 
month without going outside the gates ; first 
because there was nowhere particular to go, and 
secondly because the mud was above one's boots, 
and raging cows and occasional bulls made a walk 
something more than a fancied peril. I found 
the place absolutely filthy and the garden a mass 
of weeds and rubbish. The so-called lawn was 
a hay-field, and when we had cut the grass we 
discovered that the last tenant had used it as a 
dust-bin ; we carted off loads of broken bottles, 
old shoes, rags, bits, pots and pans, and finally 
got it into a tidy state that was very pleasing 
to behold. 

The first year I was there was a year of hard 
work and promise ; the second was a golden 
370 



GREEN PASTURES 

year of performance and delight : and our only- 
drawback was the lack of water, which made us 
dread fine, hot weather, when all had to be 
fetched, and which made the problem of keeping 
a garden alive at all a very great one, 

I always laugh to myself when I hear people 
talking about the cheapness of country life, and 
how much one can have for very little expenditure 
of money. So one can, if one can work hard 
with one's hands oneself, and if one never wants 
to read, or buy seeds, plants, or books, or the 
thousand and one things that make Ufe pleasant, 
and, indeed, possible. Rent is cheap, but often 
rates are high ; and one must have men-servants 
in the shape of a coachman and gardener; and 
then one is asked, even in the smallest country 
place, for endless subscriptions to all sorts and 
kinds of things ; and though one need not give, one 
must, if one wants to be on speaking terms with the 
people. Beside which there are facts one finds 
out for oneself, such as sick children and worn-out 
mothers, which entail putting one's hand in one's 
pocket if one wishes to have a quiet conscience. 
One does not object to any of these ways of 
spending money if one has it to spend, but I only 
mention them to show that the country is not 
a cheap spot to live in, for it most certainly is 
nothing of the kind. Then all repairs and altera- 
tions cost five times as much in the real country 
as they do in a town, and naturally so ; and to 
one's rent one has to add these items translated 

371 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

into hard cash; while carriage and postage are 
hkewise important matters, unless one is content 
with very little and a very humdrum existence 
indeed. If any one would be kind enough to 
settle a comfortable income on me, I would at 
once return to my dear green pastures ; but I must 
have a good country town near me, a good carriage, 
and above all a good gardener, who can not only 
garden, but at the same time do what he is told 
to do, whether he likes the idea or not. Indeed, 
one of the most disagreeable changes I found in 
the country was the great and appalling difficulty 
I had in obtaining and keeping anything like 
male labour. I had an old man, first, with an 
excellent character from an employer who wanted 
to get rid of him at my expense. He was not 
at all a bad old man, but he was too old to work ; 
he hid seeds and roots instead of planting them ; 
and finally he left " on his own " ; the place 
was too dull for his wife and daughter, who had 
a splendid six-roomed cottage and a garden, in 
which, given an adequate water-supply: which 
it has not : I should be very glad to end my days. 
I used to hear complaints all round that the 
workhouses were full of able-bodied men, but none 
of them ever came my way, and I again engaged 
an elderly man with a superfine character, with 
a wife prepared to do every single thing I wanted 
her to, until she arrived and was settled in. The 
man had been a splendid servant in his day, but 
that was long since over and done with ; he had 

372 



GREEN PASTURES 

had at some time or other a paralytic seizure, 
and he was nevei happy unless he was talking, 
or else strolling about with a gun with the farmer, 
who allowed him to help shoot the overwhelming 
rabbits. But as he could not garden, and the wife 
gradually found she did not like work, once more 
the change had to be made, and I found myself 
for a short time in comparatively perfect peace. 

By this time I and the garden were on the 
most excellent terms, and the flowers were a 
sight to be seen, while I had tamed the birds to 
such an extent that they were absolutely fearless, 
and the wild squirrels used to come at regular 
hours for their nuts, which they took first off the 
*' birds' table," then off the tea-table, and finally 
out of my hands ; while if the nuts were not put 
out early the squirrels would knock against my 
window and awake me at dawn to attend to 
their wants. 

It was at this delightful place that I made one 
of the all too short friendships of my later life, 
and to the dear memory of Arthur Tomson that 
spot will always be sacred indeed. He was one of 
the " younger men," as we always used to speak 
of those who had never belonged to the Royal 
Academy ; and I heard of his residence near me 
quite by chance. It was astonishing to me to 
hear of an artist living in the country ; I always 
thought of them as existing, as in our old days, 
in the hub of the universe, London, always in and 
out of each other's painting rooms, always living 

373 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

with each other and exchanging their latest ideas 
for pictures and on art generally, and I could not 
believe in any one who was willing to live in a 
country town. Fortunately we had a mutual 
friend, Barry Pain, and when he was staying 
with me I asked Mr. Tomson to come over to 
luncheon ; he did so, and we appeared to take 
up a friendship made in another world at once ; 
and for the short year or eighteen months he lived 
after that meeting we were friends in the truest 
sense of the word. I never met a more delicate 
or delightful soul ; his ideas were crystal- clear, 
his home was the happiest in the world, and 
when he died the world was poorer, not only 
for his own family and for his friends, but the 
world of art and letters, which he had served well 
and faithfully for many years. He too shared 
my love for animals, and he and his wife were 
witnesses to one of the curious coincidences that 
occurred in that place. When I was there first 
no birds or squirrels frequented the wood, and 
one day I saw a great many squirrels on the other 
side of the hill, and I openly expressed my 
sorrow that the dear things did not live with me. 
" Why don't you invite them ? " he asked 
whimsically ; and very solemnly we laid the 
case before the squirrels, and then went on our 
way with a laugh. The next day, by some 
strange fate, the squirrels came into the garden ; 
they were " royally entreated," and we had a 
quantity always running about until just before 
374 



GREEN PASTURES 

we left. I always suspected an enemy shot the 
little creatures, but I do not know ; all I do 
know is that from that day to this not one 
squirrel has been seen near the place ! 

I made great pets, too, of the nut-hatches and 
tits. Tits are very easily enticed, and even in 
London I have regular winter visitors who delight 
in the cocoanuts and suet put out for their 
entertainment ; but nut-hatches are not supposed 
to make friends quite as easily as do the friendlier 
tits. But at that house the nut-hatches used 
to come for their nuts to the tea-table, and one 
day, when I had been out of their particular form 
of nut for two or three days ; for owing to stress 
of weather, I could not get into the town; 
when I put out their nuts they calmly cleared 
off the whole lot, not using from their store as 
usual during the day, but carrying off all. They 
had been deprived of the food for a few days ; 
there might be another famine ; best store while 
they could against it ; and yet " they say " that 
birds cannot reason, and only act in a mechanical 
manner when they act at all ! 

We once more invited some guests to the 
garden when, acting on a sudden freak, the 
swallows which had always built unmolested in 
the church porch were driven away by some 
stupid and malevolent person. Five times did 
the poor little things build their nest ; five times 
was it knocked down ; at last we went up and 
once more solemnly asked the swallows down to 

375 



^ 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

our porch. Next day they came, built, and 
brought up their family of five. I have witnesses 
still alive to both invitations and both accept- 
ances. No doubt the arrivals both of squirrels 
and swallows were coincidences ; anyhow they 
are facts, are curious, and as such worth mention, 
I think, to all who care for the happenings one 
may come across in green pastures. " Their 
tameness is shocking to me," says Alexander 
Selkirk on his island ; to me the way creatures 
fear men and the ubiquitous boy is far more 
shocking. I should like every animal in the 
world to live on friendly terms with me; and 
though I have a curious and foolishly idiotic dread 
of fluttering feathers, which prevents me touching 
a bird, or being able to be in the room if a bird 
is flying about; as long as they walk or hop I 
delight in them, and wish that the London cats 
could all be belled — I won't say destroyed, though 
I feel tempted to do so. For if there were no cats 
in London, the birds would be very tam.e indeed, 
they want food and water so badly ; and I have 
several in my apology for a garden which delight 
in the bath put out for them winter and summer ; 
and in the food that is always at their service. 

We had other visitors in that garden which 
were not as much appreciated, for they really 
were most alarming, and these were the peregrine 
falcons that breed in the cliffs near by. One day 
one struck at and killed a white pigeon, but it 
struck in such a manner that the pigeon was 
376 



GREEN PASTURES 

flung across the lawn dead, and the falcon lost 
its meal. Some one was in the garden and picked 
up the pigeon ; it had blood on its breast and 
was stone-dead, but as it was also quite stiff, we 
think the fright killed it as well as the blow. 
Another day the same falcon came rushing down 
on the little birds feeding on the lawn ; for- 
tunately they saw him in time, and scattered 
into the sheltering rhododendron bushes. When 
he struck he struck the bushes, and stayed there 
a few seconds, surprised, I suppose, with out- 
spread wings, while we watched him in terror. 
At last he departed, and to my great joy I never 
saw him again ; he looked enormous to my 
frightened eyes, and I was thankful indeed when 
he made off. 

That special valley would have been a paradise 
for a bird-lover, for situated as it is between the 
sea and the cornland, one used to have many 
strange visitors Once the small squacco heron 
was seen there, blown in after a gale ; it is a 
dainty, pretty bird, and was the only specimen 
known of since some time in the 'sixties. 

We used to have also an overwhelming plague 
of rats ; personally I do not mind them^ but as 
they took to climbing up the ivy and clearing up 
the food on the birds' table, the table had to be 
moved and the rats destroyed. They are rather 
alarming at close quarters, and, moreover, make 
the most ghostly noises that I have ever heard. 
Rats account, I feel sure, for all the ghosts that 

377 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

have ever been ! Any one who has spent a 
winter with rats can, I am certain, bear me out in 
my statement that there is no noise a rat cannot 
make, from ringing a bell, groaning, quavering, 
and pattering about, down to the most peculiar 
sighing that I have ever heard. 

We once had, too, what we called " a sending 
of mice," and as all the world has read, or ought 
to have read, " The Sending of Dana Da," by 
Rudyard Kipling, I think my readers will know 
what I mean. For one solid week we found mice 
everywhere ; mice upstairs where a mouse had 
never been seen ; mice in garments, which they 
tore to shreds in the night, apparently to make 
into a nursery ; mice in the kitchen and in the 
stables ; and mice on the hearth when we came 
into the sitting-room. A little poisoned bread 
and butter disposed of them at once, and no mouse 
ever came again. Could they have fancied that 
our love for birds and beasts extended to them ? 
If so they were grossly mistaken ; the poison gave 
them notice to quit, and we were never troubled 
any more as long as we were in the house. 

Then one hot summer we had quite a " sending " 
of moles. I should have let them alone myself, 
but I had a small, most precious " warrior " dog 
who would have none of them. The first he 
went for bit him, so all the others he killed— and 
he accounted for some thirty-three — he seized 
behind on the neck and shook until they were 
dead ; he then brought them to whichever of his 
378 



GREEN PASTURES 

human friends was nearest, and looked up for 
the praise he conceived was his due. 

How can I end my book without a word or 
two, written in tears, indeed, about the dear dogs 
I have loved and lost. For, dogless though I am 
now, I have had these faithful companions ever 
since I had a will of my own. Was there not the 
faithful " Jerry " whose rough coat dried my tears 
when I came to the end of one of my delightful 
visits to York ; who listened to all my sorrows 
and sympathised with me all the days of my 
later childhood ? Then came " Pearce," so named 
for " Idstone " of the Field, who gave him to me : 
he gave untimely notice during one of my ab- 
sences from home of a late supper-party in the 
kitchen. Mama descended at his bark, to look for 
the ever-expected burglar, and found an anything 
but pious orgy going on downstairs ; so the cook 
lost "Pearce," and my heart was sorely wounded 
indeed by her cruel act. Then we had " Tiny"; 
but personally I never loved him. He was sent 
down from Hull because he was always being 
stolen from Mr. Rousby, the colour-maker, the 
father of the actor ; and he thought he would be 
safe with us. Safe ! He was stolen three or four 
times. Once he returned so full of unpleasant 
animals that Papa treated him with turpentine, 
and nearly drove him mad ; and once the poor 
little thing was shut up into the painting-room, 
and. Papa having the key, no one could get at 
him. The gallant housemaid tried getting in 

379 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

at the window to feed him, but the policeman 
caught her, and advised a locksmith. One was 
procured, and " Tiny " was released, having 
considerably damaged the arrangement of the 
draperies, to preserve which intact the painting- 
room door had been locked. Then he was stolen 
for the last time, and Papa let him go ; no further 
reward was offered, and we never saw him again. 
A long series of dogs has ended, as far as 
my love is concerned, with two very different 
characters; one "Snuff," a brown mongrel who 
was meant for a pug, but only kept the tail and 
colour of his mother and reproduced the terrier 
body of some unknown ancestor beside. The 
other was "Scrap," the dearest, daintiest, sweetest 
Yorkshire terrier that ever breathed, and who will 
never have a successor in my heart. He it was 
who slew the moles ; while " Snuff " was possessed 
of all the talents and crimes that a dog can 
have and be guilty of, and made stray friends 
and did deeds that no dog immortalised in the 
Spectator has ever made or done. At one time 
he used to disappear regularly after dinner and 
reappear at 10 p.m. ; we could not understand 
this until one day a friend came to call and in 
a measure elucidated the mystery. I say in a 
measure, for all " Snuff "did was to appear by their 
fire at about nine, sit opposite their dog, "Jack," 
until ten, without exchanging so much as a 
growl ; when he would get up and return home ; 
and this he did for months : indeed, until "Jack " 
380 



GREEN PASTURES 

went away, when he ceased going out to call 
altogether. Once he was turned out of the draw- 
ing-room by the master of the house for some 
fault ; I think he had been rolling in odoriferous 
mud and was not dry; that dog deliberately 
took out the very pet slippers of his master, hid 
one on the railway embankment, and left the 
other (in the dark) carelessly on the lawn, as 
much as to say, " You can see them for yourself 
in the morning, when you won't require them." 
He was always a most pugnacious beast, too, and 
had a strange hatred for large black dogs ; small 
black ones did not trouble him at all, but the 
larger the black dog the fiercer was his rage, and 
he has cost us pounds for vet.'s bills, for he had 
to go and be mended more times than I can 
count. Once he went poaching with two other 
dogs, who led him away on that occasion, for he 
had never poached before, nor did he ever again. 
He had thirteen shots put into him by an irate and 
horrid old man. Fortunately the poor little fellow 
got home, covered with blood. The vet. extracted 
the shots, and he recovered; but though his 
assailant has long been dead, I yet hate him with 
a hatred that makes me hope that in another 
world he may be the dog and '* Snuff " the man. 
Albeit if " Snuff " is, I am quite sure he is too much 
of a gentleman ; ragamuffin as he was ; to retaliate. 
** Snuff's " long career was ended by cancer. He 
had two operations, but they were no good ; he 
had to be put to sleep. And then came on the 

381 



FRESH LEAVES AND GREEN PASTURES 

scene my last pet darling. But of him I cannot 
write ; he lies under a stone in the garden, and 
I can but re-echo the verse I placed above him 
here : 

Thou who didst bid this gentle spirit live 
To him in Thy wide Heaven a corner give. 

After all, the best of life is what we recollect, 
the places we have seen, the friends we have 
loved ; and if it sounds absurd to place dogs 
amongst these latter, absurd it must be. My 
dogs have been my real friends, and have made 
green pastures green indeed for me by their 
kindly wiles and pleasant ways. Now that the 
sun sinks one remembers all that was good and 
sweet, and forgets the bad. One can hate no 
longer with the old fierce hatred, but one can 
love. Love is the one strand that never gives. 
Have love for some one, something ; one's country, 
one's home, even, oh ! scoffers, for one's dear 
dead, faithful dogs ; and let life be what it may : 
somewhere, somehow, we shall always find some 
spot that can be to us as green pastures ! 

December 14, 1908. 



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